Barbara J. Hamby

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Farewell, Kind Sir

Apropos of my recent comments about brief encounters, I discovered an obituary of a former boss in the Sunday Oregonian. When I first moved to Portland, this man was my supervisor at an insurance brokerage firm. I can’t remember whether he, or his boss, hired me. The pay was poor, but the education was valuable. I probably worked there about a year and a half or two years before I quit to await the birth of my second child.

The obituary was very comprehensive--a good biography of his 87 years of life. I can’t remember now what he looked like, but he must have been a very patient man. I knew nothing about boilers and machinery when I took the job in that department. I had a few years of insurance experience that had mostly involved autos, boats or homes, nothing industrial.

The October 1962 windstorm occurred shortly after I went to work there. That experience is included in my memoirs. An insurance office was no place to be in the days after that storm.

Reading about the man who was my first boss in Portland, helped straighten out some memories in my mind. I remember the names of most of my supervisors at my many places of employment. However, I can’t always remember which name goes where.