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WILLIAM LEE LINDE
APRIL 30, 1948 - OCTOBER 16, 2003
October 26, 2003: Gowanda Penny Saver
William Linde,
of Collins Center,
died Oct. 16, 2003. He was the
son of
the late Lloyd and Bernice (Mattice)
Linde;
father of Corinna Linde, Michelle
(Kim) Abbey and Brandy
(Antonio)
Cruz; and brother of Betty (Bernard)
King,
Tina Schichtel, Cathie Dunklemam
and the late Dalton and
Arlene Linde;
also survived by five grandchildren.
Bill was born
William Lee Linde on April 30, 1948, the son of Lloyd
George and Bernice Mable [Mattice] Linde. Bill graduated
from Springville Griffith Institute in 1967 . He began
working at the Gramco Feed Mill in Collins, NY shortly
there after.
Bill married
Mary Clair Waterman on July 12, 1969. There first child,
Dawn was still born, her resting place is the St. Joseph
RC Cemetery on Cemetery Hill in Gowanda, NY.
Bill and Mary had three additional children, Corrina
born 1978, Michelle, and Brandy. A Family page is also available.
The marriage ended in divorce in, yet Mary has
remained a vital part of our family.
During the
1990's Bill was found to have a malignant tumor in his
brain. Although surgery prevailed, Bill never totally
recovered. In 2003 Bill finally succumbed to a variety
of physical ailments, having known of only four of his
seven grandchildren.
Click on the
names of Bill's children for more pictures and
information.
 
Bill about 4 Years Old Bill about 16 Years Old
Mary Waterman Linde Bill & Mary at their wedding
July 12, 1969
Bill, Mary & Corinna Linde Bill Mary Michelle & Brandy
Corinna's Baptism
I would like to share two stories about Bill, both
concern me. Most of my memories of Bill
involve him knocking my Hostess SnoBalls out of my
hand, onto the ground because he knew I wouldn't eat
anything off from the ground. That way, after he had
finished his, he ate mine as well. I also remember
him grabbing my Smoky the Bear out of my
arms, running as fast as he could and throwing it in
the creek. Of course, I'll never forget how often he
would coax me to climb the slide that had to be held
in place in order to be used, promising that he
wouldn't let go, only to get to the top of the slide
and have him let go so the slide and I fell to the
ground. So on the rare occasions that he did
something especially out of character, I remember
those things fondly.
Every year all of us kids were required to attend
Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve. On my sixth
Christmas, I recall walking through the cold and
snowy night heading towards the Catholic Church in
Collins Center. I was really feeling sorry for
myself that night, for earlier in the month I had
been that since I never got anything good for
Christmas, I must be really bad! I suppose my
feeling was this: if I was bad and wasn't going to
get anything any good anyway, why did I have to walk
through the cold snowy night to go to church?
Anyway, I was legging behind the others when Bill
stopped and waited for me to catch up to him. He
tried talking to me, but I just kept my head down,
mumbling my answers. Finally, Bill yelled, Look!
Quick Look! but I continued to ignore him. By
that time, Margaret had drifted back to where we
were. Did you see it? Bill asked. Margaret
agreed that she had seen it when Bill yelled
There he goes! Finally I looked up but saw
nothing but a bright moon. Oh, man, Bill
said, you missed him? Missed who? I asked.
Santa Claus, he just flew in front of the moon!
How he knew what was bothering me, I will never know.
What I do know is that he brightened my mood
immensely. Stranger yet was what I found the next
morning, a tree filled with presents! Prior to that
Christmas had meant either a coloring book and new
box of crayons or bubble bath. That year was a year
of miracles. On my birthday, Mom had taken me to
meet the real Santa [Santa knew my name, my sister's
names, my Mom's name and he knew it was my
birthday!] But, I will always believe that Bill made
that memory last.
The second memory involves my dog Lucky. As many of
you may remember, there was a time that Mom,
Margaret, Lola and I resided in a trailer attached
to Pa & Bernie's house. When I was about eleven
years old, Mom sent me to the trailer to take my
bath and get ready for bed. I returned to the house
complaining that when I went to turn on the hot
water, I felt a tingling in my arm and ended up on
my butt across the room. I always had a vivid
imagination, so of course, I wasn't believed; my
story was thought to be a ploy to stay up longer.
So, once again, I was sent to get ready for bed.
I remember it was raining that night, so Mom said I
should take Pa's soup to the house and she would get
my dog Lucky and bring him in. Lucky had been
chained to the metal tongue of the trailer. When Mom
called him and he didn't respond in any manner, she
went to check on him and found him lying on the
ground, dead. When she touched him, she received a
shock.
She ran to the house calling for help. Once the
electricity was shut off and we were able to get the
dog unhooked from the trailer, his death hit me and
I started sobbing hysterically. Bill went outside
and spent forty five minutes trying to do CPR on my
dog to bring it back to life. When Pa finally
managed to get Bill to stop his attempts and come
into the house, I saw that he was crying too. He
hugged me so tight and just cried and cried. All he
kept saying was, I'm so sorry, I couldn't make
him live.
We would later learn that the electricity to our
trailer had been incorrectly hooked and that the
electricity had never been properly grounded. We
were told that I was a very lucky girl, if it hadn't
been for the dog taking the full voltage of
electricity, I would have been killed. Maybe Lucky
was not a proper name for my dog, but I was
certainly Lucky that he had been chained to
the trailer that night.
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