James Winston Rogers

James Winston Rogers

Guest blogger today, Patricia Rogers Seliger, my cousin who knows a lot about our ancestors (and has been a great resource for me.)  She contributes here about her own father, my uncle.

James Rogers at Sentry Insurance

My father, James Winston Rogers, was born in Fort Worth, Texas on January 14, 1922 to George E. Rogers Sr., and Ada Phillips Swasey Rogers, the youngest of 6 children.  

When his father took a job in San Antonio around 1934, the family moved there and lived in a home at 1201 Woodlawn.  At Jefferson High School, he played trumpet in the ROTC band, and joined the Non-Com Club, the Architectural Club and the Statesman Club.  Today, my brother John, also a musician, has my Dad's trumpet.  

Dad also played the piano and sang in church and community choirs.  He had a deep bass voice, and loved to whistle and sing around the house too, singing songs like “The Yellow Rose of Texas,” ”The Streets of Laredo,” and ”Dixie.”  He made sure all of us kids took piano lessons, but really struck pay dirt when my brother John showed unusual talent at a young age.  Today John is a composer and teaches music at the University of South Carolina.  

George Elmore Rogers Sr and his son, James Winston Rogers

He joined the Navy in December 1941, and was stationed in Corpus Christi, Texas. He went through Naval officer training in Memphis, Tennessee, where he met Dorothy Hehlke, whom he later married.  He received his Naval flying wings in Sanford, Florida in 1945. My mother told that he was in San Francisco awaiting deployment to fly to Japan when the war ended.   He never lost his love of flying, and my sister Chris inherited that love from him, earning her own pilot’s license. 

Upon discharge after the war, he attended the Art Institute in Chicago, and then moved to Wisconsin where he worked as a commercial artist. In 1955, he joined Hardware Mutual, now Sentry Insurance, and worked in the art department. He moved to Stevens Point in 1965 and retired from Sentry on February 1, 1985.

My father and mother had 4 children, Patricia, Christina, Cynthia, and John.   My mother was Lutheran, and my father left the Christian Science church where he had been raised, and joined the Lutheran church, where he was active.  We children were all raised Lutheran. 

Christina, James, Patricia and Dorothy Rogers

You can take the boy out of Texas, but you can’t take the Texas out of the boy.  Dad kept his soft Texas drawl throughout his life. And loved to wear a cowboy hat and boots.  Dad and Mom bought a camping trailer after I had grown up and left home, and my siblings tell the story of how a tornado was threating the campsite one time, and they remember Dad in his cowboy boots and hat, and boxer shorts tightening down the awning on the trailer.  

He maintained his lifelong interest in art, history, reading, and genealogy, and instilled an interest in genealogy in me.  Art and creativity also seem to run through our family too.  My sister Cindy has a talent for art, I have a degree in Interior Design, and my cousin Barbara designs and makes very unique and lovely ceramic pieces. Dad had an art studio in our home, and we loved to sit and watch him paint and draw.  I remember the Sentry Insurance logo on his drawing board.  He also joined the Toastmaster’s Club, and became quite an accomplished speaker.  I wonder if my sister Chris’ love of words came from him.

I moved away from Wisconsin to Arizona in 1976, but continued to correspond with Dad regularly and we spoke on the phone often.  We wrote of philosophy, religion, and family history, and his letters were full of news.  I still have some of them.  My mother and Dad did come out to visit several times.  By 1987 I was operating a 5-acre horse farm, and in February after he retired, Dad undertook a trip across the country to visit. 

He was drawing and painting horses by that time, and came out to visit to go with me to the Arabian Horse Show but he was only able to go with me once.  I was shocked at how weak he was.  He spent most of the visit on the couch, and in spite of my objections, he was determined to drive across the country to visit my sister, Chris, who was in Virginia.  I often wonder if he had a premonition and wanted to see us to say goodbye, because he died of a massive heart attack later that year.

My father died on September 13, 1987 in Stevens Point, Wisconsin.

Patricia Ann Rogers Seliger