I met Bil during one of the early Hidden in the Hills Studio Tours. I was delighted to see him come down my driveway, because in the early days I was the only studio in Carefree, with very few visitors. He was a visitor.
He came in the door talking and never stopped talking. To say that I didn’t know what to make of him would be an understatement. He spied the cartoon strips that I keep on my desk. Once he learned that I was a cartoonist’s daughter we had a ready-made relationship. The fact that I had lived all over the Garden State only added fuel to his fire. Bil especially like my big easy chair and moved right in for about 45 minutes that initial visit. He drew the first of eight of his portraits of me, while sitting in that chair.
Then he asked me to marry him.
As the years went by he would just show up. Not always during the studio tour, either. He would again ask me to marry him, saying “Ginnie, you are the only person in town who has had experience living with cartoonist.”
And he delighted in asking me to marry him in front of a studio full of visitors during the tour. He’d again ask for my hand in front of people who were there to look at the paintings, and he’d walk up to visitors and say, “Don’t you think we’d make a fine couple?” After he had spoken to every guest he’d wait in the big chair for the next group of visitors to arrive. Sooner, but often later, Bil would go out to my patio to pester Steve and Donna who were exhibiting out there.
Then he would come back through the studio for one more marriage proposal before heading home.
Eventually I had to come up with a plan to get even. One year, during the tour, I had about seven women in my studio when I looked up and saw him chugging down the driveway, headed for a direct hit. I quickly huddled with those women visitors, none of whom I knew, and enlisted their help. I had just enough time to hatch the plan before he came through the door, spouting his marriage proposal.
That’s when the seven women surrounded him, hugs and all, and chimed in unison, “ WE’LL marry you, Bil!” It was the only time I ever saw him without words.
PS: Don, you had a very fine cartoonist for those 20 years. One of the best.
Ginnie Brooks
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