More Than Meets the Eye

Sometimes a person enters your life who makes such an impact that you wonder if the person was simply a mirage that you saw on the horizon. A figment of your imagination. Bill (pictured) is one of those individuals. Arriving in Patton, Pennsylvania, at age five by way of Cleveland and Baltimore, he lived there until he was 18. After a stint in the Navy and 16 years in Warren, he returned—and has stayed—calling Patton his home.

Like many of us, Bill has battled demons and has overcome family situations that no one should ever have to experience. He has endured his tragic past and has come through to be a tenderhearted, kind, and creative individual. After Navy basic training in Florida and ACE school in Mississippi, Bill was stationed in California—which he hated. He went from a town with two red lights to six lane highways; “California was just too fast,” he recalled. He was thankful to return to Pennsylvania during his three day bus ride from the west coast, with pitstops in Chicago and Cleveland.

Many nights, Bill can be found hanging out on the stairs of his former apartment in downtown Patton. He was on these stairs when we first met. And for a week we would have occasional conversations, only to be invited later into his home to bear witness to his humor, infectious laugh and smile, and inner beauty.

Bill doesn’t believe himself an artist. “I just like things,” he explained. But he is a creator of beautiful painted objects and wood pieces, and surrounds himself with delightful art glass, unique objects of art, collectibles (including his sunglasses collection), and ephemera. In his dining room, an amazing piece of art glass can be found next to an 100-year old blue Mason jar, next to a working lava lamp. He sometimes gets bored with where he has hung pictures, and will randomly move them around from room-to-room, much to his wife’s dismay. 

Bill’s candor at times can be brutally honest and sometimes fantastical. 

In September 2013, an animal rights activist group, The Animal Liberation Front, claimed responsibility for opening the doors of hundreds of cages at a mink farm in neighboring Ebensburg, releasing more than 600 mink. While mink are native to Pennsylvania, these species of ranch mink developed for the fur industry have been around since the 1860s and have no idea about finding food and water—these are domesticated animals and can’t survive in the wild.

A treasured piece in Bill’s eclectic collection is one of these minks—now stuffed—two of which he found while cleaning out a friends house in Coalport a few year’s ago. The mink now resides in a cage on his work bench. “Just look at that face, creepy!” Bill hooted. “I put it out on the sidewalk one day and my neighbors were like, ‘what the fuck was that?’”

Bill shares his space with his long-haired dachshund, Jinx, who is very protective of him. 

As we leaf through a stack of local, historic postcards, Bill’s knowledge and reminiscence of Patton is a point-of-pride, and he shares his wisdom freely and unfiltered.