Meet Bob Noll
So. You think you’re lucky? Do you really believe that you were born under that proverbial star?
Then you have to meet Bob Nall and compare notes.
“I’ve got the most unbelievable guardian angel ever,” St. Peter’s resident world traveler said recently. “It’s almost a little embarrassing.”
If you visit Bob in his well-appointed Leawood townhouse with all the tasteful collection of art and mementoes marking more than 60 years of travel, don’t bother to challenge that claim.
Except for winning a waltz competition at 16, Bob’s youth in Atchison, Kansas was unremarkable. Or so he says. He should have had a hint of what might be in store in 1944 when, after two uninspiring semesters at the University of Kansas, he was drafted.
Bob showed up at the induction center in Leavenworth to find himself in front of a table and being told that he was a lucky guy because on that particular day, some draftees had a choice between the Army and the Navy. With visions of blistered feet and a dogface infantryman’s lot and, alternately, life on the beautiful ocean, Bob chose the Navy very quickly.
It got better.
As he is now, Bob was a ruddy-cheeked hale and healthy fellow with but one physical drawback: pretty bad eyesight. So he found himself stamped “special assignment” which meant no sea duty, no combat. So Bob spent the duration of the war as a yeoman clerk in the San Francisco Bay area, mostly typing papers for less than five hours a day and enjoying one of the world’s most stunning cities. Uncle Sam, probably upset at Bob’s good fortune, marked Bob fit for an overseas assignment. Once again the angel stepped in. While he was at the embarkation center Japan obligingly surrendered and Bob stayed in California.
He returned to KU but, like many young men who had seen a lot more than Lawrence had to offer during the war, he not exactly stimulated. A lifelong friend from Atchison who was at KU at the same time felt the same way. Only this guy’s family had a large bank account and allowed him to make a four-month tour of Europe. To Bob’s surprise, his own parents not only allowed him to accompany his friend, but slipped him $1,500 and a ticket on the luxury liner Queen Elizabeth.
That sum was substantial in 1947 and went a long way in post-war Europe. Bob and his buddy spent the four months in Britain, France, Italy and Switzerland.
Bob returned to KU for the third time in the fall of 1947 and promptly met that girl from heaven that becomes a lucky man’s wife, Laurel Sue Crabb. They were married a year later.
He had a wife, a brand new degree in Economics and no job a year later when Macy’s moved into downtown Kansas City, offering a junior executive training program. Bob took the job and a 26-year career in department store retailing.
Bob and Sue moved to Fort Scott in 1951 where he became assistant manager of a small department store. Life was good, with the two children arriving, first a girl and then a boy. They joined St. Andrew’s, the Episcopal Church in Fort Scott.
After 12 years Bob was eager to buy the store outright but the owing couple said no, but that as soon as both of them passed away it was his for free. Bob said he wasn’t willing to wait that long and didn’t want them to die any way. So he quit.
Again he found himself without a job and prospects when The Lady stepped in. The owner of a women’s store in Fort Scott offered Bob the business that he ran for the following 12 years. He retired in 1975. The sale of the business had been profitable and there was also the matter of a few healthy inheritances.
Bob and Sue, who had taken some short tours of Europe while in Fort Scott, now took journeys on a more regular basis. A favorite was several weeks on a barge floating on the canals of southern France.
But tragedy struck in 1988 when Sue passed away, the victim of lung cancer.
Five years later Bob was still in Fort Scott in a house too large for his needs and too full of memories. So he moved to Kansas City and into the lap of St. Peter’s.
Luck wasn’t done with Bob Noll.
Bob is an avid needlepointer. And no, you don’t have to smile when you say that because when you see what has done with a needle and thread you’ll have no wisecracks to fall back on.
While in San Francisco one year he visited a needlepoint supply store near Fisherman’s Wharf and was so impressed with the goods and services that he became a mail customer for several years. Another Kansas City area resident named Joanie Sherman who owned a needlepoint supply shop in Brookside happened to visit the same San Francisco shop. The owner told her about Bob Noll. Joanie wondered, not happily, why a KC man so avid about the art didn’t patronize her store. One day Bob did just that. Joanie saw his name on his check and demanded to know why it had taken him so long.
The two have been close friends for 18 years now. They have also traveled extensively through Europe, India and China.
His world treks have exposed Bob to a great range of people, cultures and religions. Now 81, he says his faith remains solid as well as his belief that no one denomination or even religion can or should claim an exclusive franchise on God’s favor.
“I believe in God,” he says matter-of-factly, “and I think God is for everyone.”
Oh. There is one other story that shows how luck may actually flow though DNA.
Years ago Bob’s grandfather owned a drugstore in Atchison. One day, during remodeling, he had placed the store’s old soda fountain outside while a new one was installed. A man approached the grandfather and asked him if he could buy the soda fountain. The grandfather agreed. The man didn’t have enough cash. Would he take the deed to a piece of Texas land? The fountain wasn’t worth much so the grandfather accepted the deed that he later willed to Bob and his sister.
A few years later, guess what was discovered under the ground of that Texas property?
If luck is embarrassing, who doesn’t want to be a little red-faced now and then?
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