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He graduated from Illinois College in 1906. Roy apparently inherited a building in downtown Bluffs from his father. It was described in the Centennial of Bluffs: "Sept. 5th (1944) the 75x50' business property at the corner of Oakes St. and Wabash avenue in Bluffs was sold by R. G. Van Gundy to J. P. Monta, J. A. Knoeppel acting as agent. During the past several years this property has been in the Van Gundy family, the rooms in the two-story, concrete block building thereon...which had over 6500 square feet of floor space...have had various occupants, such as telephone exchange, furniture store, dry goods store, grocery store, amusement hall and living quarters." When asked about her father's occupation, his daughter stated that she didn't remember her father ever working at a job. He owned land and several businesses which were leased or rented. Her father's work consisted of managing and keeping the land and businesses in good repair. The family lived comfortably but because the parents were not overly generous, the children did not realize their family was wealthier then most in the area. It was not until they reached adulthood they discovered that fact. Daughter, Mary, remembered their family's first automobile. Her father left to buy one and returned 2 weeks later with the contraption. She was not sure where he had to go to buy it, nor what kind it was. Roy was invited to be the speaker at the commencement exercises at Chapin High School one year. The subject of his oration was his opinion of The Monroe Doctrine. |
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Roy and Clara dated at least 3 yrs before they married as he was making visits to her house weekly, on Sunday evenings, at the time of his father's attempted murder in 1923. |