Born and raised in Lutie, Oklahoma for about 5 years, Corrine Falke landed in Heritage Health 94 years later. “I cannot believe how old I am, I do not know how I got here so fast.” Corrine is the Heritage Health Spotlight for the month of July.
Her family made the move to Illinois when she was 5 years old. Both of her parents were immigrants from Italy. Her father came to Oklahoma 5 years before her mother came over. His brother lived in Oklahoma already, so it was easier for him to find a job. Then her mother came over 5 years later with Corrine and they settled in for a handful of years before they moved to Wilsonville, Illinois.
“Growing up was wonderful,” she said. Her mother had two brothers. One of them had 4 daughters and the other had 3 daughters. It was a blast for Corrine and her two sisters. “All girls, it was the best.” Corrine said they always used to play run-sheepy-run on their block.
Her father mined coal in Oklahoma with his brother. “The mines were very dangerous back then,” Corrine added. Her mother had two brothers living in Mt. Clare at the time who also mined coal. As she remembers, her mother spoke to one of her brothers and they persuaded her it was easier mining up north. So, as you can guess, that is when Corrine’s made the move to the BenGil area.
“I grew up in Wilsonville,” Corrine explained. Her family lived with her uncle until they could find a house. Her father ended up working in a mine in Wilsonville, so they thought it would be best to live there. “It was a whole different day,” Corrine laughed.
As she grew up in Wilsonville, she remembers playing on the square in Wilsonville until it got dark every night. “We would start as soon as the sun came up and when it went down, we had to go back home.” She enjoyed growing up in Wilsonville and loved every day of it.
Corrine went to school right in Wilsonville. It was actually very nice, she recalled. The toilets were outside, Corrine smiled, “it was another day.” Up until the eighth grade, Corrine went to Wilsonville. Then she started high school in Gillespie.
If it were not for basketball, Corrine would not have loved school so much. “I liked to play that game,” she noted. After graduating from a rather large class of over 100 at least, she got married right after high school to Wilbert.
She met her husband at the bridge in Mt. Clare. “The kids used to gather there or we used to go down to the big swing in the evening,” Corrine started. “We always had to be home in the evening. No one had cars, it was not like today.”
It was at the bridge where she found her love. The people from Gillespie would come and play with us. “I don’t know what we did there by that bridge,” Corrine said, “But we always had fun.”
Wilbert and Corrine got married and stayed in Wilsonville for $2 a room. “I never dreamt of going to work, but one day I was by the sewing factory that just opened and the owner asked me, ‘Would you consider going to work at the sewing factory?’” So, she went to work and stayed there for about 18 years off and on.
She took some time off when her mother died because her father moved in with them. Then after losing her father a month later, her family moved closer to Gillespie by the Fassero’s. “The Fassero’s became family as well as the Valero’s, they were thrilled we moved there because we had two little kids.” Their two boys were Bill and Wilbert, named after his father.
Wilbert was working on the railroad around that time, but Corrine and him loved to watch their boys play baseball, football, and run track. “I remember one day my oldest boy forget his football towel. So, I made him walk back to Benld and get it,” Corrine laughed. The towel smelled terribly she recalled, so it had to be washed on a regular basis. “Its not like that now-a-days, they will pull a car out and go get it.”
When asked if she went on any vacations, Corrine balked. “Vacations?! We went to see relatives!” She had a brother in Chicago, so they went there quite a bit. Then Bill, her son, lived in Rolla when he was in the Army, so they went to Missouri often. He was also stationed overseas twice, so that is how they visited Germany. Corrine had her relatives in Italy, so Italy was a familiar place for the Falke’s. “I went to Italy four times. Bologna was absolutely wonderful!” The food was the best part, Corrine said. It was made fresh every day.
“I have a lifetime of memories,” Corrine closed. She was living in Staunton Assistant Living initially with her husband. Then, she fell and broke her shoulder. She now resides in Heritage Health. “I did not want it to end this way,” she went on to say. “We did not want to be separated.” But, Corrine looks at from an optimistic point of view. She was married for over 75 years, she never had any trouble with her boys, she had a wonderful marriage, both of her boys went on to graduate from school, and she has always been very healthy.
“The girls here are very nice!” Although she said it is not home for her, it is the closest she will get. Corrine hopes one day her and her husband will get to join back together at the same place. That would be a wish come true!
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