Lillian Elizabeth Moseley (1918-1996)

Picture of Lillian Moseley


Lillian Moseley in high school
Lillian Moseley in high school, 1936

Individual Facts

  • Name: Lillian Elizabeth Moseley
  • Sex: Female
  • Also Known As: Lilly, Lil
  • Birth: 2 Mar 1918, Buffalo, Erie, New York, USA
  • Death: 27 Mar 1996, San Jose, Santa Clara, California, USA
  • Burial: San Jose, Santa Clara County, California, USA

Birthplace: Buffalo, NY

Lillian was born in 1918 in Buffalo, Erie County, New York. At that time, Buffalo was a busy industrial city and lake port. Life there was shaped by factories, railroads, grain elevators, and shipping through the Great Lakes and Erie Canal system. Many families were working or lower-middle class, and daily life centered on steady work, church, neighborhood ties, and ethnic communities, including many German, Polish, Irish, and Italian families.

In 1918, life was also affected by World War I. The war increased industrial production and jobs, but it also brought worry, rationing, and patriotic pressure at home. Later that year, the "Spanish flu" influenza pandemic hit Buffalo as it did much of the country.

Most homes had electricity by then, but many routines were still labor-intensive. People relied on streetcars, local shops, newspapers, and close-knit family networks. So, a child born in Buffalo in early 1918 entered a world of hard work, strong immigrant-rooted neighborhoods, and major national change.

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Buffalo, NY
Buffalo, NY

Biography of Lillian (“Lil” or “Lily”)

Lillian “Lil” or “Lily” was born on March 2, 1918, in Tonawanda, New York. She grew up there and graduated from Tonawanda High School, the cross-town rival of North Tonawanda High School, which her future husband, Harold, attended.

After finishing high school, she worked at the A&P grocery store in Tonawanda—the only paying job she ever held. Later, when we were children, she would sometimes tell my sister and me stories about things she had supposedly learned “in the Army,” though she had never actually enlisted. We believed her completely at the time.

My mother was an exceptional cook. Her spaghetti and crab gumbo were especially memorable. She never followed recipes, instead cooking “by guess and by gosh,” as she liked to say. I can still remember the aroma of that spaghetti.

Music was another of her talents. She played saxophone in grammar school and in her high school marching band, and she had a natural gift for instruments. Although she could not read music well, she could play piano and organ by ear with ease. At gatherings at the fire hall, she was always the one at the piano, bringing music to the room.

Shared Facts

  • Marriage: (Harold Richard Johnson) 23 Nov 1939, Tonawanda, Erie, New York, USA
  • Children: 3

Relationships

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