of ranking in second place next semester as I expect to get over 90% in four subjects.”
But it did not turn out that way. On a morning early in his second semester, he fell on his way to class and injured his elbow. He insisted on going to Boston to be treated by his mother, who by now was a practicing osteopath.
He had no desire to return to school. “How terribly reluctant I was to face that discipline, and that idea of being no good and second-rate. As I got on the train going from Boston back to Northfield, I began to have terrible sensations in the solar plexus. I felt like the world was coming to an end.” Short of breath, having heart palpitations, “I was in stark panic that I had heart trouble and was going to die. Back at school, as soon as I would attempt a few simple exercises, this terrible palpitation would set in, and I would collapse.”
Following these attacks, Bill would be taken to the college infirmary, but no physical cause could be found for his troubles. “This happened again and again, until, at the end of a couple of weeks, I was sent to my grandfather in East Dorset, which was just exactly where I wanted to go.” He was overcome by inertia, unable to do anything. “I used to go into fits of palpitations and cry to see the doctor,” he said. The doctor gave him a bromide and tried to persuade him that there was nothing wrong with his heart.
Bill stayed with his elderly grandparents that spring and summer, and gradually recovered enough to consider returning to Norwich for the fall semester. An April letter to his mother shows how preoccupied he was with his health problems:
“Up to the time Dr. Grinell made his second visit, I had been miserable. Some days eating nothing and the most a few slices of soft toast. Terribly sour stomach, consequent heart burn and palpitation. This last of course scares me to death. Makes me mad to think I am scared but I am just the same.
“Dr. Grinell came about six p.m. I was feeling awfully. He applied a stethoscope and said at once that I had the best valve action he had seen for some time. Desired me to listen. I did so. Sounded just the same as it did last time. I registered immediate relief. He said that the large intestine was rather inactive, causing sour stomach, and gas. Gave me a mild physic to take after eating. Did not seem to think my stomach was out of order. Grandpa and grandma think so. Hence they pursued him until he said, ‘I don’t think diet has anything to do with this case.’ He saw that he said the wrong thing so he afterward qualified the statement, by saying, ‘Of course, he mustn’t eat too much,’ a very definite statement, you see.”
Bill’s “heart” problems were clearly temporary; he soon recovered and had no difficulty either in passing the Army’s physical examination in 1917 or in performing his military duties.
Another letter, also written that spring, indicates that Bill was feeling better, and had his mind on other things. He wanted an automobile:
“I looked over the catalogue you sent with some interest and threw it aside. Grandpa picked it up and began to look it over. Pretty soon he began to talk about the machine some. Grandma remarked that it must be hard to learn to run a machine in view of this fact that Jim Beebe wouldn’t learn to run his. Grandpa at once ‘waxed enthusiastic’ and said he guessed there wasn’t much to it. Said he bet he could learn in short order.
“Heard no more about autos for a couple days. One morn he came in from the garden and said, ‘Better send and get one of those, hadn’t we? Seems as if we might get the agency perhaps. Guess I could sell those things. Never saw anything I couldn’t sell yet.’
“Naturally I was interested. We got the terms for agents through Will Griffith (who has been offered the agency) and Grandpa had me go to Manchester and talk up the machine. I went, and banking on your consent have practically disposed of one to the Bamfords. As to the financial risk, there is none, I think. This is also Grandpa’s opinion for the selling of one machine excludes the risk element and Grandpa has a sneaking notion that he wants one anyway. We figure that there is about $85 profit on a machine.
“Now to come to my present condition. Am glad to say that sinking spells and dizziness have totally disappeared. I have palpitation on a strenuous exertion. Am yet nervous. Am convinced that will disappear as soon as I convince myself that nothing ails my heart. I have no stomach symptoms, am able to eat every thing. Am physically myself as regards weight and strength. Obviously a diversion of the mind will now effect a cure.
“I know of no subject upon which I can discourse with greater intelligence or enthusiasm than automobiles.
“Consider the body risks. There are chances to be taken. Accidents occur daily. I should say the risks encountered in autos are considerably less than those Grandpa has taken taming kicking horses or that tunnel workers have of a scale dropping on their head or that you took as a child in running around on the edge of a flume or on narrow beams in the top of the barn or that I have taken every day at school with bucking horses. Consider the number of accidents also the number of autos. H. Ford runs off 1,800 of them a day. If this amounts [to a] nervous strain to which I should be subjected in driving perhaps you are the better judge. Certainly not more than steering a horse over a three-foot hurdle. Certainly no more demand upon concentrative faculties than as much violin practice. Certainly a more healthful occupation. I have heard you say that no more exhilarating and yet mild form of exercise existed than motoring.
“Now as to the danger which would be peculiar to me. Perhaps at this moment I am not fit to operate a machine because I am too nervous. But I’m not going to be this way all summer. At the present rate of improvement, shall be restored in another month.
“Normally, you know I am about as excitable as a mud turtle. It cuts me to think you have not enough confidence in my judgment to allow me to do what Jamie Beebe, Clifford Copping, Francis Money, David Cochran, Lyman Burnham are allowed to do without the parents entertaining grave fears as to their safety.
“Rogers [Burnham] has driven since he was 14. I should hate to think my judgment at present is not the equal of his at that time.
“Again, autos have come to stay. They will soon be as common as horses.
“You consider yourself competent to drive a machine with safety. You even would like to have ridden the motorcycle. You certainly could do both. But I should be fearful of your trying the motorcycle as you are that I attempt the auto. Love from Will.’’ In a later letter to his mother, there is no reference to illness or doctors. He had been hired to play the fiddle for ten dances, for which he was to receive five dollars per dance. His confidence in his own playing had clearly risen, as he told his mother:
“I do think that I can put myself through school with it. Have played enough for money now so that the thing has lost its glamor and it really seems like work. Have improved a lot since you were here.”
During the summer of 1915, Bill had a job peddling burners for kerosene lamps in nearby villages. That summer, Lois had opened a small tea arbor at the north end of Emerald Lake. Bill found a number of reasons to turn up at the tea arbor during the day. “He didn’t sell many burners and I didn’t sell much tea; but we had wonderful visits,” Lois said. “Often I would give him a treat of wild strawberries or fried picked-on-the-hill mushrooms on toast.”
By late summer, their courtship had become serious. But Bill had competition: Several years earlier, Lois had met a young Canadian named Norman Schneider at a young people’s church convention. Norman’s family owned a meat packing firm in Kitchener, Ontario. Lois and Norman had dated; he was a good person, nice-looking and intelligent. She had enjoyed being with him. Now, he came to the lake for a week’s visit, and just before he left to return to Canada, he asked Lois to marry him.
Lois, who had longed to be with Bill every minute she was with Norman, had her answer. “Just as Norman stepped on the train for Montreal, Bill jumped off,” she wrote. “We walked back to the lake together. But somehow our fingers often seemed to brush against each other.’’
That same evening, they told each other of their love and became engaged. (When asked many years later whether she had any regrets, Lois replied: “Never, never, never, never. It never occurred to me. I never dreamt about anybody but Bill Wilson.”)
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