Robie

About the Book

Robie was adopted at the age of three, from an orphanage in Sydney Australia. Her adoptive parents were from Boston Massachusetts. Her father was very kind to her, but her mother treated her with disdain. Her given name was really Florence; she never knew why her father called her “Miss Robie”, for that was their family name.

When Florence was eleven, her father died suddenly of a heart attack. He was a missionary and away from home at the time. Florence was in a boarding school. After the funeral was over Florence’s mother did a very strange thing—she took Florence to a barber shop and had him cut her hair into a boy’s bob. Next they went shopping for boy’s clothes even boy’s underwear, all the way to boy’s socks and shoes. Florence was screaming in protest, to no avail. When they returned home, all of her pretty, feminine clothes were boxed up to be given to charity. As her mother was driving her back to the boarding school she told her the reason for this strange behavior. She said, “You are now going to be the boy I wanted to adopt down there in Sydney Australia. Remember the little boy that was clinging to you and crying? He was your twin brother. I wanted to adopt him, not you! His name was Francis, I’ll call you ‘Frank’ from now on.” it was one of the hard things Florence had to deal with in her young life.

As she grew into a lovely, young, intelligent woman and had graduated from Vassar College, her mother died of cancer. Flo was then free to do what she wanted. Her mother had left their home to her. She sold it and with the large sum of $3,000 she left Poughkeepsie, via a boat on the Hudson River, to live closer to New York City. She wanted to find a challenging job. First, she needed to buy women’s clothing and learn how to wear them.

Then, she obtained a clerical hob at the Westchester Country Court House in White Plains, N.Y. then she found a boarding house where she was the only woman boarder. She was twenty-five; had never worked at a paying job and was very ambitious fun-loving. She began going to ‘speak-easies, after work, with other girls from the office. She learned to do all the dances of the era. She dated some of the young attorneys she met at the court house.

Eventually she met a tall, blond man who attracted her. He was of German decent and wanted to control her, but she was too independent for that. Their affair had many hot and cold times.

In 1930 she found a notice on the bulletin board--- a test would be given in Albany for the position of Clerk-of-the-Court. Never had a woman held that prestigious position. She bobbed her hair, bought another man’s suit and a derby hat and boarded the train for Albany. She had signed her name: F. Robie. She lowered her voice when she had to speak to anyone. She came away with the only perfect score on that test. The Judges at the County Court House were not too happy with her. From then on, she was called Robie, not Miss Robie.

In 1932, Robie and Rudy became engaged. She put Rudy off until 1934 for the marriage. In 1938 Rudy was driving home after drinking too much at a bar in New York City, where he worked, and hit a tree head-on. Thereafter he was a paraplegic. Robie had her work cut out for her, then, She stayed with the Courthouse until she retired in 1967. Rudy had a stroke in 1966. life became even more complicated.

They found an empty lot beside the Indian River, in New Smyrna Beach, Florida, where they had a house built. They lived there in peace and love until Rudy died on 1974.

After Rudy’s death, Robie had another romance.

This story begins in Robie-Flo’s birthday in 1975, which was her 75th birthday. Some of the happenings are depicted in flash-backs and dreams. I’ve used Italics to differentiate.

She had a propensity for attracting interesting people and at times bazaar things would happen as a result.