Florence Doty & Joseph Diffley

Florence Eleanor Doty
Born: April 3, 1914; Grand Forks, North Dakota

Joseph Leo Diffley
Born: August 10, 1917; Imperial, California
Died: February 9, 1979; Barstow, California

 
Florence Eleanor Doty was born on April 3, 1914, in Grand Forks, North Dakota.  Anna Brett Doty and Will Doty had been married nearly 20 years and were childless.  Years before Anna had become pregnant, but had lost the baby.  There were no further pregnancies.  They lived in an apartment in Grand Forks, North Dakota; Will was a policeman.  A lot of people knew that Anna wanted a child.  Many knew that Will wanted one also, but wasn’t willing to raise someone else’s baby.  Then Anna received a call from a woman who owned a nursery (it was probably a home for orphans).  She told Anna that they had a baby girl there who needed to be adopted, and would Anna and Will like to come and see her?

Anna, Will, and Anna’s best friend, Leah Morefield, went to see this baby.  She was about 6-8 months old, old enough to sit up.  They stood around marveling at this cute little girl.  Will was leaning on the crib rails, his hand dangling inside the crib.  He was about to tell Anna why they should not adopt and try to raise someone else’s child, when the baby grabbed his finger and cooed at him.  He turned and dashed out of the nursery.  Anna didn’t know if he was angry or sick, but all discussion about adoption stopped.  In about half an hour he returned with diapers and bottles and toys.  The adoption went through and Will and Anna had their baby girl.  They named her Florence Eleanor Doty.

When Florence was about 9, the family moved back onto the farm.  Life was good.  Florence had a dog, a pony named Danny, and some rather reluctant cows.  Her best friend, then and now, was her cousin, Margaret Brett Glenn.  Margaret was from a family of 11, and it seemed to Florence that Margaret’s family was very selfish to insist that she remain with them.  After all, they had 10 other children, and Florence needed a sister.  But they lived on neighboring farms and shared a lot of adventures together.

When Florence was 14, both families moved to Seattle, and she and Margaret attended a Catholic High School.  Boys were on one side of the classroom and girls on the other (several rows of desks separated the genders).  She didn’t care about the desk separation because it was the boys at the public school who interested Margaret and Florence.  To catch the attention of the boys from the public school they would hike up their long uniforms and pull their coats tight around their bodies as they walked home past the public school.

Joe and his older brother, Walt, raised rabbits for the table.  The lot where their home was located was very large, and when Walt and Joe were young men they had a paint manufacturing plant on the back part of the lot – The Diffley Paint Company.  In later years this property was owned by a sister of Florence’s mother, known affectionately to the children as Aunt Maggie.  Joanne Irvin remembers an adventure she took with her sister, Maureen, into the by then abandoned paint plant.  There were rotting bags of paint color everywhere, vivid color spilling all over the floor, old rusted mixing machines, cans of stuff.  It was impossible to walk through there and not collect color.  When they emerged Maureen looked like a rainbow.  Though she turned Maureen’s shirt inside out to try to hide where they had been, it was to no avail.  They were caught.

While living in Hollywood, Florence joined the Zombies, a Catholic Social Club.  The friends she made there have remained her friends all her life.  Joe was also active in Catholic youth groups as a member of the CYF, the Catholic Youth Federation.  It was through these connections that Joe and Florence met, though both had different remembrances of the event.

Joe told his children the story this way.  “Your mom came to the house.  She was selling tickets to a Valentine's Day Dance.  I agreed to buy two tickets, if she'd go with me.”  Florence’s version goes like this.  She and a friend had been at a dance and needed a ride home.  Her friend suggested they ask Joe Diffley.  He seemed quite delighted to give the girl friend a ride, but then the friend asked, “Will you take Florence home also?”  Joe looked Florence over and seemed disappointed, but he agreed to take them both home.  Florence looked at Joe and thought “that's the man for me.”

Regardless of which account is the more accurate, after Florence met Joe she made certain that he was always invited to any activity the Zombies were sponsoring.  Years later Joe reminisced about the Zombies and what a great group of people they were.  “Why, they hardly knew me, but they were so friendly.  I was always invited to their parties.”

Joseph Leo Diffley married Florence Eleanor Doty on September 13, 1941.  On December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor was attacked, and the US entered World War II.  Joe and Florence’s first child, Joanne Lee Diffley, was born on August 1, 1942.

Joe was trained as a meteorologist through the US Army Air Corp in Illinois, and then was sent to Darwin, Australia.  He always said he enjoyed his time in the service.  His company had a polo pony they called Low Gear, and they adopted a baby kangaroo that slept in a bag hung on the wall.  But it wasn’t all fun and games, they were charged with making flights over enemy territory gathering information as well as determining weather forecasts.  While Joe was away at war, Florence provided her part to the war effort working at an airplane factory.

Joe was discharged from the service with the rank of Sgt., on New Years Eve, 1945, and returned to his pre-war job at Firestone as a manager.  A second daughter, Maureen, was born on October 4, 1946.  A third daughter, Denise, was born on October 30, 1948.  The family then moved from Inglewood to Barstow, where a son, Bill, was born on December 20, 1951.

Joe studied accounting at night.  He wanted to be a CPA, but finally gave up that goal because of the requirement of a year working in an accounting firm at minimal salary.  He received a Bachelor’s Degree and later a Master’s in Business.  Joe was a builder and an inventor. He developed his own solar heated pool long before it was a popular notion.  He was always building, renovating, shopping for used furniture to redo.  Most of his projects were useful, some were beautiful, but he did make one set of bookcases that couldn't fit through the door.

Joe was the tax accountant of record for a lot of poor people.  Every year from January through April 15, people would come to the door with shoe boxes full of receipts and Joe would bring order to their tax year.  There was an entire system of bartering that was encouraged.  Joe was paid in milk and peaches and even in chicken manure.

Joe worked at the Marine base in Barstow in a succession of positions, finally retiring as a GS 12, and the first civilian given a lifetime membership in the Officer’s Club at the base.  As members of the Officer’s Club, Joe and Florence enjoyed a wonderful, active social life, and met many fascinating and life-long friends.  Florence stayed home while the children were small, but returned to work on the Marine base after Bill started grade school.  Florence and Joe helped form the Barstow Credit Union on base.  She worked part-time at the credit union and then moved to full-time employment in the Traffic Division on base.  When Joe retired he received a standing ovation at his retirement party (the colonel that retired at the same time received polite applause).

When Bill graduated from high school and left for the Air Force Academy, Florence and Joe planned trips for their annual vacations and traveled extensively in Europe.  They loved helping their children with yard and house projects and would often come for a visit and spend the time working on a project.  Just after Christmas in 1978, Joe had a heart attack while they were visiting Maureen and Pablo.  He spent a couple of weeks in the hospital in San Mateo, and was finally discharged home when he promised to make an appointment with the local cardiologist.  He was readmitted to the hospital in Barstow to correct an arrhythmia.  While in the hospital he was administered a drug overdose which stopped his heart.  Joseph Diffley died February 9, 1979.