Noreen (Winnie) Fern Hook, June 11, 2013. A resident of Santa Clara, Hook was 107. She was born Noreen Fern Bastian on February 14, 1906, in San Jose to Louis and Fern Vicy Bastian. In 1923, she met and married Wilbur J. Hook, her husband of 60 years, who preceded her in death in 1983. They had two daughters Esther (Rick ’49) Rechenmacher and Sharon ’70 (Bill ’60) Gissler.
"She lived in poverty in various places around the Bay Area, including San Jose and Oakland, but Winnie was always an optimist, always positive about everything," said her granddaughter Cynthia Gissler ’85. "That was one of the great things about her."
She had a clear memory of life early in the last century, when electricity replaced coal oil lamps, when automobiles replaced the old streetcars. As a girl, she went to the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco and the memory stayed with her.
"It seemed like a wonderland to her," Gissler said. "She had never seen a pineapple or had pineapple juice, and here was a pineapple juice fountain with all the juice you could drink."
She was 17 when she met Wilbur John Hook at a drugstore in Alameda and they were married soon afterward. It was a lifelong love affair. "He called her Winnie and that was her name ever after," said Gissler.
Mrs. Hook was a stay-at-home mom and the family moved to Santa Clara in 1927. "She was also a wonderful foster mother to young people who needed help," Gissler said. "Years later, they would come to see her as adults and thank her."
Mrs. Hook graduated from high school but did not attend college in the formal sense. In the 1930s, however, she became a member of the Catala Club at Santa Clara University and remained active in it up until her death (see "
And the ladies of the club…" in the Winter 2010 issue of SCM). The society raised money for scholarships at Santa Clara, and Mrs. Hook attended lectures by professors.
She was the loving grandmother of 15 (Heidi [Ananda], Laura, Sandi, Joseph, Nancy, Clare, Hans, Toby, Ted, Merry, Vonna ’83, Cynthia, Mark, Stephen, Andrew ’89), great grandmother to 38, and great-great grandmother to 21. She was a loving aunt to the McTighe and Anderson families and was preceded in death by her three younger brothers Aaron, Lawrence and Everett.