When my mother was 34 years, a confirmed old maid, she enlisted the services of a famous fortune teller in Syracuse who was known for his accuracy in his predictions. And the story he told her she knew had no validity. The fortune teller told her she would get married to someone from the Northwest, have two to three children, and would travel frequently to Europe and beyond; all the while visiting museums, meeting artists, painters and dignitaries. Although by middle age there would be a tragedy that would turn her world upside down. After which more travels would ensue along with moves to different parts of the country.

Well it was too late for my mom to get her money back from the Fortune Teller. So she went home to 530 Oak Street and told her Mom the fantastical fortune and both had a good laugh over that whopper.

Within 2 months my Aunt Betts, also known as Betty Wose, brought in a gang of SU graduate students and my Dad was in tow. He asked Betty who was that beautiful young woman in the living room and Betty said, "Oh don't bother with her, that's my little sister." Fortunately Dad didn't take that advice and within six months they were married. My father was from a small farming community in Eastern Washington State. The first part of the fortune came true.

While my father's professional career is well documented, what is less known are my father's early years and what formed the man he was to become. Sadly I never knew my grandparents on my father's side because both had died before my father married. My Dad's mom had quite an unusual upbringing. Her mother, my great grandmother died young in childbirth leaving two small girls behind, so my great grandfather who was in sales and traveled most of the time, left his daughters on a Native American reservation and school in Montana. So in the late 19th century, my grandmother and my great Aunt Eva were actually playing real "Cowboys and Indians," with their friends on the reservation and at the school. Both girls had pinto ponies and according to family legend my Great Aunt Eva was quite plump and loved riding the open Montana plains on her pony. Her Native American friends loved to give out nick names, and my Great Aunt became "Floating Mountain Flower".

My Dad's father owned the principal mercantile store in the county. He did not know what to do with his only son who loved the housewares department and women's fashion in his store. The earliest picture I have of my Dad was when he was 4 years old. His parents had staged a picture of Dad with a small rifle and a dead squirrel. There are tears streaming down my father's face because he was so upset about the squirrel. My father never liked hunting despite both of his parents were skilled with rifles. Dad tried to please his father by joining the high school football team, although he never took to the sport. In turn, my Grandfather sent Dad off to the Hill Military Academy in Portland Oregon to toughen him up. Again he did not take to the military academy.

As a newlywed, my father thought he would take his new bride to Montana where he own property on Flathead Lake and wanted to start a lakeside resort there. After one month of what my mother called extreme roughing it; Dad brought my Mom home, back to Syracuse. There were lots of stories from my Mom about bears and outhouses. Montana was not her cup of tea.

So Dad bought G.R. Crockers in downtown Syracuse, a fine china store that handled Wedgwood and Spode, and my parents were soon off to England buying china at factories throughout Great Britain. Along came my older brother, Freddy, and then me five years later. Hence the two to three kids, that was predicted by the fortune teller an earlier decade.

In 1963, the tragedy that the fortune teller spoke about unfolded. My Dad received a call from the boarding school in Philadelphia where my brother was attending. Freddy was unconscious in the hospital and within 4 days my older brother was dead. Out of this extreme tragedy, a stronger, life long bond was cemented with Dad's good friend Ted Hancock who helped Dad to simply get through it all.

After more than a decade of owning Crockers, Dad's friend, Ted Hancock told him about the directorship at the Everson Museum. It was an exciting time to be at the Everson because there would be an architectural competition for a new facility. A relatively unknown architect in the late fifties was chosen to design the new Everson, by the name of I.M. Pei. Pei was Dad's first choice.

Two years later after my brother's death, my father accepted the position of Executive Director of the newly formed Kentucky Arts Commission. A move was needed for both my parents after Freddy's death. What floors me to this day, was the pinpoint accuracy of the fortune teller in the late 1940‘s, who project into the future 25 years later.

Recently, I was having coffee with a good friend of mine in Cambridge and she talked about dysfunctional families, and I told her I thought mine was functional. And she said, "Margot, there's no such thing as a functional family." And I said, "We got pretty close." And she said "Well that's boring."

Growing up in the Hull household was anything but boring. My parents loved the theatre and many warm summers we spent in Stratford upon Avon in Canada with the top British actors playing Shakespeare. Every year as a teenager our family would go on theatre junkets to London and see the latest drama, farces and perhaps a musical.

What amazed me growing up were the deep life-long friends my father made. The stories that were shared over one of Dad's homemade pies and a good bottle of wine. His friends became our extended family with stories that added a richness to ours. One such friend of Dad's, was Dr. Peter Witt. While Dad was the Director of the Everson Museum, a board member said you really need to visit the Witts out in DeWitt. He has an extensive collection of all the major impressionists but they are all miniature paintings. And Dad visited and looked at a collection that was beyond belief. At first, Peter just said that his parents visited Paris while the impressionists were struggling artists. After years of friendship, and many shared meals with the Witts we put together an amazing story of a wealthy German Jewish family and how a chauffeur drove the family to Switzerland during the height of Nazi Germany supposedly for a weekend trip and in the few bags they carried were all the miniature impressionists. The many large paintings of the Impressionists were left behind in their house that has become a national museum in the heart of Berlin.

Peter and Inge's two daughters, who were close to my age, became my friends. And Dr. Witt went on to become a researcher in Raleigh, North Carolina, one of 8 arachnologist in the world. Once when they visited us up at Selkirk, our summer home, Dr. Witt spied a small spider on our porch. He explained how rare the spider was and we were then scrambling to find a matchbox, punched holes in it and arranged for a special overnight delivery of the spider to Raleigh. I never looked at spiders in the same way. There are too many friends like the Witts to mention. But looking back on my father's life, I was grateful to be a part of it all, that added a rich tapestry of a life well lived.

One of my father's greatest joys in his life was his granddaughter, Tavery. I will always remember when Tavery was 8, she put on the CD of Pink Martini and the two of them danced away in the living room.