The government's promised extra support payments never materialized. What Richard could send
from his GI paychecks was hardly enough to sustain the three Gin
women. Only 13, Sue Ling pitched in by going to work, first as
an attendant at a laundromat--not the one once owned by Richard--then
as a waitress at a smorgasbord called Bit O' Sweden. She worked
every day after school and full-time on weekends. During the summers
she worked two jobs. Despite that she kept up a solid B average,
doing especially well in math, while racking up a longer list of
activities than most. During her freshman year she was in the drama
club and participated in the school play.
She also contributed time and energies as a member of her school's chapter of the
Junior Red Cross. As a sophomore Gin added cheerleading and the
Girl's Athletic Association of which she was treasurer. The G.A.A.
seems to have been active in putting on dances as well as playing
sports like basketball and field hockey. As a junior Gin dropped
cheerleading and the school play. In her last year she was back
in the play and was elected Junior Red Cross treasurer. She also
found time to become a member of the Usher's Club.
"She was a popular girl, well liked," recalls Richard. Somehow she even found the time to date "quite a bit."
By the time Richard returned from the army to start learning carpentry
while attending college on the GI Bill, Sue Ling had grown into
a capable, independent 15-year-old who had been heading up the
household for two years. Her steady stream of waitressing jobs
included a stretch in Paradise Inn, the restaurant formerly owned
by her late dad, as well as a place called the Saddle & Spur. At
around the time she graduated from East High and started at Aurora
College, she had moved up to working at the Fox Valley Country
Club.
Aurora College was a small, intimate institution with a combined student body
of only about 250. Back in those days men outnumbered women two-to-one,
and the women pretty much restricted themselves to majors like
elementary education and English. It held little promise for an
agressive, highly ambitious young woman like Sue Ling Gin. After
one semester, she was ready to quit and leave for the excitement
of Chicago.
[CONTINUED BELOW]
"She said that Aurora didn't offer enough opportunity for her," Richard says. "She was different
than other girls. She had big ideas. She had a lot of guts, she's
willing to take a risk. Not many people are willing to do that
much. They'll risk a little bit, but once they get comfortable,
then they won't risk any more. Sue is not that way."
Richard did nothing to restrain his ambitious little sister. "We were always pretty close," he
says. "I was always supportive of her, long before women's lib
was popular. I always felt if a woman could do a job, hey, she
can have the job. I never once thought that to be a problem."
He wasn't bothered that her first Chicago job turned out to be wearing bunny ears and selling
cocktails at the Chicago Playboy Club. Mother Gin was too isolated
to get wind of her daughter's scandalous satin cottontail suit.
The tips poured in. Sue Ling saved much of it and sent it back
to Richard for safekeeping. He opened an account for her. Later,
as her savings grew, he invested her money in a property in Aurora.
By around 1964, when she was 23, Sue Ling was ready to do her own
investing and asked Richard to liquidate her stake. "She didn't
want to be involved in [Aurora real estate], so I bought her out
and ended up with the real estate in Aurora. She wanted to concentrate
in Chicago."
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