MY LIFE – 100 YEARS!

By Elizabeth “Libby” Wheeler Hughes

Edited by Donna Hall and Charles John French Jr., NLCS Class of 1967

I was born October 22, 1919, the oldest child of Thomas H. and Beatrice Briggs Wheeler on the Briggs farm in Stephentown, NY. My dad was a dairy farmer and my sisters (Mary, Beatrice Jane, and Doris) and I started young helping to feed the cows and calves. At the age of seven, I attended the one-room school near home in North Stephentown. I could already read and do some math. I did not learn to write, but printed everything, so I was expected to learn about writing quickly.

I spent three years in the country school and was sent to a larger school in Stephentown where I took the Regents Exams and completed the eight grades. At the age of nine, I passed all the Regents exams with a mark of 75, which was the passing grade to enter high school, which I did at age 10.

A bus was sent to the post office in Stephentown where we all boarded and rode ten miles to the village of Lebanon Springs where the high school was. This was a new building and the school was called New Lebanon Central School; it certainly seemed huge to me! I took regular college entrance courses of English, History, Latin, French, and Algebra, and finished the requirements to graduate.

However, I was too young to work or be admitted to Albany State Teachers’ College when I graduated at age 14 with the class of 1934. Therefore, I went back to high school where I took business courses for one and a half years and was admitted to Albany State Teachers’ College in January 1936. After I turned 16, I began to work at Sykes Store in Stephentown where I made $10 for six days. I worked during school vacations so as to be sure to have money for school. I also worked in the Milne School Guidance Office (part of Albany High) and learned quite a lot about office procedures and the work of the Guidance Department. I graduated from Albany State in 1940 with a major in business and filled out a year in the New Lebanon Central School, and then taught there one more year, after which I moved to Canton, NY to teach business. I remember that my sister, Jane, and Helen Koepp were both in my first shorthand class.

World War II was hard-fought and many men were leaving their jobs and women were filling in for them. I taught my regular classes in Canton and also did some guidance work as I had received a degree in Guidance through Saturday classes at St. Lawrence University. Elliott Hughes was responsible for this work and when he returned from the service to his job in Canton, I was pleased to hand that extra guidance work to him.

I really enjoyed my job in Canton and made money during my five years there, plus I made many friends over that time. After that time, Elliott and I decided to get married, which we did on October 11, 1947, in Stephentown at the Briggs house. He was offered a job in New Hartford, NY where he would become the elementary principal and eventually would become Director of Elementary Education there. We moved to New Hartford and looked for a house to buy. Houses were hard to find, so during our first year there we kept looking and shared two rooms across from the elementary school. We eventually found a large farmhouse and barn on Red Hill Rd. and bought the property. The place had beautiful views on three sides and is still standing. We settled down, Elliott at his job, and I soon began substitute teaching and later taught business subjects and did guidance at NY Mills Union Free School. 

In 1949, we adopted sisters, Darlene (three years old) and Mary (five years old) and in 1952, our son, Reese, was born. I gave up teaching and stayed home taking care of our children for five years. 

We became acquainted with a couple who owned an Avion trailer and we joined the Mohawk Travelers, a local trailer club, and spent weekends camping at state parks with the group or on our own. Elliott especially liked the St. Lawrence River area and eventually we bought a lot on the river where we could park our trailer. 

By 1972, Elliott had taught for 25 years and also managed elementary education in New Hartford and he felt he should retire. The school had a retirement party for him at the end of the school year and also announced that they were changing the name of the school to the Elliott R. Hughes Elementary School, in his honor. He was very surprised and pleased and always carried a picture of the school (with its new name) with him! 

Elliott had already produced a program to use when we visited schools. It was called “Early American Household and Farming Tools.” We carried many artifacts with us and he demonstrated the farming and I showed household work, including spinning wool into thread on a walking wheel. (A person who spun all day would easily walk a mile or more.) Elliott also became the first president of the New Hartford Historical Society and later on a room was constructed, called the Elliott R. Hughes Room, to house the large collection of artifacts that we used in our school programs. I also served as the historical society president. 

Elliott was retired for 15 years and we did quite a bit of traveling in the US and Canada, a week’s trip to Spain and a cruise to the Bahamas with his sister and her husband. We spent part of the winters in FL for several years and trailered there and back. We also presented our historical program to the National Avion Club at one of their meetings in FL.

One spring, shortly after returning home from FL, Elliott had a heart attack. He was in the hospital for only five days when he died in 1987. I returned to FL and also decided to have a couple take our trailer to FL to spend the winter. My daughter, Darlene, and I went to Tampa by train where a friend met us and took us to the park where the trailer was already parked. I later saw a motorhome that I thought would be easier and safer for me to drive. Elliott and I had been looking for a motorhome which I could use before he died, so I was pleased with my purchase! I drove back and forth to FL many times and even to CA, with Katie the cat, my traveling pal.

I continued to work part-time for a lawyer in Tarpon Springs, FL, and returned to New Hartford every spring. I continued to live on Red Hill Rd. and kept the two horses that Elliott and I had owned. King, the older one, had been a fire horse in Pittsfield. I was also active in the Methodist Church, joined a Bible study class, and became good friends with the young minister and his wife, whom I had met when Elliott was sick. We have been good friends for over 30 years now, sharing our joys and sorrows. I thank them so much for their loving care and try to extend the same to them. 

My family has changed, my three sisters have died, as has my brother, Thomas. My son, Reese, died in 2007 and my daughter, Mary, died in February of this year. I had lived in an Independent Living community and now I live in an Assisted Living community in New Hartford since July 2017, so I now have help with my medicine. I have liked living at both places. I am also planning on attending the annual Wheeler reunion at the Briggs farm in August of this year. My life has been good!

Editors’ note – Libby wrote out this autobiography for us and we visited her twice this year at her facility in New Hartford, NY. She did attend her Wheeler family reunion in August and is also in weekly contact with her sister-in-law, Lisa Wheeler. We were also given permission to include her address if you wish to send belated birthday wishes for her 100^th!  .....

                                                                                                       Photo by Charles John French, Jr.