William R. Stowell Working on Property Where He Built a Brand New Home for His Family in Bethel, Maine (1969)

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William R. Stowell working on his new property in Bethel, Maine. It’s unclear who took the picture but I’m assuming it was my mother who he built the house for.
William R. Stowell working on his new property in Bethel, Maine. According to dad, he was working on the well.
William R. Stowell working on his new property in Bethel, Maine.
William R. Stowell’s 1967 Ford Mustang convertible parked at my mother’s family home in Gilead, Maine. I find it interesting that my dad spent quite a bit of time at my mom’s parent’s home, visited Canada on a couple different occasions, and built a beautiful home for his wife. It appears my father was smart, a good provider, and a hard worker.

I always wondered what happened to my parents and why they got divorced and neither of them would ever talk about it. My mother unfairly told me and my brother my father was “evil” and did her best to alienate us from a loving father, including replacing him with her second husband. And my father was angry at my mother after he learned what she did to me and my brother. He referred to her as a “zero.” He put on the deed to the home I inherited that if anything was to happen to me that my brother, not mother, get his home, a deed that will carry his disdain for her for life.

Appendix A: Meaning and intending to convey and hereby conveying the same premises conveyed by deed of EEB and BCB to William R. Stowell, dated September 5, 1996, and recorded in Book 2366, Page 53, at the Oxford County Registry of Deeds. Provided, however, that any conveyance of the within conveyed property to the Grantee’s mother, ACC, and now supposedly known as AD, by deed, devise, intestacy, gift or any other method shall be void, and thereon said property shall vest in the Grantee’s brother, RRS, if surviving, then to the Grantee’s lineal heirs, if surviving, and if nor surviving, the to the surviving heirs or said RRS. (new deed to property after gifting the house to me in 2001)

What I learned looking through all dad’s photos is that he did a great job as a young man being a provider for his family despite impregnating two younger women who did not appreciate him as a person or see him as a man with agency. They erased him to their children’s detriment. While dad was in college he impregnated a young woman who had his first son on August 16, 1966. My mother told me that he was cut out of the child’s life and asked to provide a settlement that amounted to 18 years of child support money… as if they wanted him completely out of the picture. I do not know if this is facts but the end result was that my father was cut out of his first born son’s life and replaced with another man, just like me and my brother. No one cared about him.

Dad graduated from college in January 1968. His second son, who was given up for adoption in Colorado, was born on August 17, 1968. This is interesting given it was almost exactly two years later after his first son was born. I am assuming he impregnated my mother in November 1967. This means my mother was 16 years old if she was born in 1951. My father was seven years older. From what I can gather from his personal effects, he quickly moved to an apartment in Lakewood, Colorado with my mother after he graduated from college, they got married in March 1968, and this is where they would give William R. Stowell, Jr. up for adoption. (I have a number of postcards my father sent my mother while he was on the road providing for his new family)

It appears my mother attended high school in Colorado while she was pregnant. And after they gave William Jr. up for adoption, they moved back to Maine. My mother finished her high school education in Gorham, New Hampshire where she graduated in 1969. My father was working as a civil engineer for the State of Maine. According to photos, it appears my father spent all his time with my mother and her family in 1969. And in July 1969, they documented dad working on the new property in Bethel where he built a house for my mother. No one ever came out and said they were hiding my mother’s pregnancy but given the timeframe it makes sense.

This is the same house I was brought home from the hospital to after I was born in 1972.

It appears the house my father had built in Bethel, Maine was completed in 1971, the year before I was born in March 1972. By the end of 1972, they had sold the new house to my future gym teachers and moved to Lakewood, Colorado. Photo: William R. Stowell (1971)
Jennifer was born in March 1972. After leaving the hospital, she returned to Aline and Billy’s new home in Bethel, Maine. In almost every photo my father took of my mother, she looks angry. Notice the trendy leather shorts referred to as “hot pants” in the early 1970s. Photo: William R. Stowell (1972)

Related Links:
William R. Stowell Memorial Site on Instagram
William R. Stowell Graduated Third Honors from Gould Academy in Bethel, Maine (1962)
William R. Stowell Graduated from the University of Maine Orono with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Civil Engineering (1968)
William R. Stowell Designed Railroad Crossing on Nuclear Carrying Rail for Mare Island Naval Shipyard, Vallejo, California (1985)
William “Billy” Stowell Playing Guitar with a Local Band on Mollyockett Day in Bethel, Maine – Video by Mike Stowell (1991)
William R. Stowell Plays Mandolin at a Friend’s Wedding in West Bethel, Maine (1992)
William R. Stowell Takes a Trip to St. Augustine, Florida to Visit Friends & the Castillo de San Marcos National Monument (1992)
William R. Stowell Takes Pictures of First Snowfall at Home in West Bethel, Maine (1992)
“My Last Visit with Bill” by Peter Stowell (2001)

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