This is a studio portrait of Pat Hutchins (Florence’s/Mom’s cousin) that must have been taken about 1919. (Pat would have been three years old in March 1919.)

I’ve mentioned some of these details before, but some will be new…

Pat was born John Ryal Hutchins on St. Patrick’s Day, 1916, in Albany. His names came from his two grandfathers, John Hammell and Ryal Hutchins. However, at an early age, he picked up the nickname Pat or Patrick because of his birthday. In 1930, when Pat was a freshman in high school, the census shows that he was still known to his mother and step-father as “John” (at least for official purposes), though he was “Pat” at school. But when he registered with Social Security in 1936, he used the name “Patrick John Hutchins,” the name he used officially for the rest of his life.

His mother, Bessie Hammell, married his father Roy Hutchins in December 1910, a little over five years before his birth. Roy started out their married life working as a farm hand in the Albany area. But at some point he decided there was money to be made as a logger in Canada. The family moved to British Columbia in July 1917, when Pat was just over a year old. They seem to have remained there until at least January 1922, when Pat’s brother William Walter (“Bill”) was born in B.C. But Bessie and the boys apparently moved back to Albany shortly after that. Bessie obtained a divorce from Roy in March 1927, in Albany, on grounds of desertion. At that time Roy was still living in Canada.

Two photos appearing in previous blog posts (here and here), probably taken on the same occasion about 1919, show Pat in Tallman during the period he is presumed to have been living in Canada with his parents. Most likely this means Bessie brought Pat to Albany at least once for a visit during the five or so years they lived in B.C.

After Pat finished high school in Albany in 1933, he attended the University of Oregon for a time, but did not complete a degree as far as I know. In 1940 he was working as a restaurant manager in Salem.

By 1946 he had moved back to Albany and bought a restaurant. That year he married Maxine (Sternberg) Dwyer, a widow who brought a young son, Rob, into the family. Pat and Maxine subsequently had two more sons, Pat and Reid. Maxine was a nurse, but stayed home when the children were little and returned to nursing later. Pat managed several restaurants in Albany, including the Candlelight, the Timber Room at the Albany Hotel, and Tops (according to Maxine’s obituary—I am not familiar with any of those).

In 1972 they moved to Portland to take jobs there, and about 1976, moved to Seattle. They remained there for the rest of Pat’s life. (He passed away May 16, 2001.) After his death, Maxine moved back to Albany to be near children. She passed away April 22, 2011.