Family Memories

"Bill" and Grammie Cousins

I was 13 years old when Granpa Willie E. Cousins died. I always called him "Bill" because when I was learning to talk he taught me to say "HI BILL". My mother has told me that I probably learned to say "Hi Bill" before I said Mom and Dad.

Bill is also the one that originated the "Virginia" for my mother, Virgie Annie (Lisheness) Cousins. Many people in Stonington thought her name was Virginia.

Bill and Grammie Cousins owned and operated Cousins Lunch Room at the foot of Russ' Hill in Stonington, ME. Their living quarters were upstairs over the lunch room. This upper story was added on before I was born. (Cousins Lunch Room was demolished in 1983 to create a right of way to the new fish pier).

Grammie Cousins cooked delicious vegetable soup, lobster stew, clam chowder, pies, and donuts. They also sold hot dogs, ice cream, candy, and soda. The lunch room was open early in the morning until late at night. Christmas Day was one of the few times, if not the only time, during the year that I can remember the lunch room being closed, and then only long enough to eat dinner and to open presents. I remember eating Christmas dinners with them. After dinner we all would go upstairs to the front room, and see the beautiful Christmas tree and open presents.

Dec. 1936 Bill had pneumonia--He was "sick in bed by Dec. 20th", he died Dec. 27th, at home. Buried in Woodlawn Cemetery.

Grammie Cousins operated the lunch room for a few years after Bill's death, then moved with her youngest son, Woodrow, his wife Clara, and their daughter Diane (they had been living with her at the lunch room) to a house at Tea Hill, a short distance out of town. Grammie Cousins died at Tea Hill March 1942. Buried Woodlawn Cemetery, Stonington, ME.

Mom and I were living with Grammie Lisheness at this time in So. Bancroft, ME. We could not got to Grammie Cousins' funeral as I had just come home from the hospital after surgery.

How Father Met Mother

The following is the story my mother told me of her meeting with my father Percy Cousins: "Percy met Virgie at a Halloween party at the "Red Barn" (1921). Virgie greeted people at the door, shaking their hands. For a Halloween trick Virgie put her hands on ice before she shook hands with the people. Instead of a friendly handshake, it an ice-cold handshake. When Percy entered and shook hands with Virgie, he was so surprised by the ice-cold hand--that he swore! Those were the first words he said to Virgie. After the party he took her out to eat at Cousins Lunch Room--their first date. They were married Nov. 11, 1922, in the front room, upstairs over the Cousins Lunch Room. Grammie Cousins (Sarah L.) and her sister, Aunt Mary Grant attended the ceremony. Granpa "Bill" Cousins could not attend the ceremony, as a customer came in the lunch room right at that time." My mother also told me that "Woodrow, Percy's youngest brother, was about 4 years old when Percy and Virgie where married. They took him with them, most every place they went."

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