Young Hoosier "Who Knows What the Future Holds?" Bill

Bill was born in Riverside, California and raised in Indianapolis, Indiana with his younger brother Norman.  He has the Hoosier’s love of basketball, and enjoys golf, snowboarding, hiking, biking, and other sports.  A member of Professional Ski Instructors of America (PSIA), Bill has taught skiing at Timberline on Mt. Hood in Oregon and in Fairbanks, Alaska, and currently teaches downhill at Titus Mountain.  A real “people person” with an affable personality, a huge smile and twinkling blue eyes, Bill enjoys the role of short-order cook and all-around Jack-of-all-trades, maintaining equipment, building everything from bookcases to birdhouses, preparing the garden beds for planting, and more.  When he is not occupied with Bed-and-Breakfast tasks, you might find him out and about working in the construction firm he founded, Loucky-Ramsey Builders, meeting with Cub Scout leaders, serving on a community board, working with youth at church, or enjoying time with Joanna and the dogs.

Joanna’s mother Mildred was born of a Bohemian mother and Slovakian father, one of two sisters among seven brothers who grew up on a farm in the Finger Lakes region.  As a young woman, Mildred became an evangelist to children, traveling in the American South and Southwest before venturing to Europe to work in Czechoslovakia.  There she met and married Lou, a youth evangelist from Prague.  When the Communist government expelled her,  Lou became a refugee, sailing with her to America in 1950, where they established a home in Syracuse, New York, in the shadow of Syracuse University.  Children came in rapid succession until they had “a quiver-full” — three boys and three girls.  Joanna was the fifth in the line-up.

Early training to learn how to mow the lawn at the B&B

The Loucky children shared their two-family, three-story home with university students, professors, and business people from over 160 different countries, who dubbed the hospitable oasis “the Little U.N.”.  That experience profoundly influenced the Loucky siblings, giving them a love of people from all walks of life and teaching them that joy comes from sharing what you have with others.   Read more about what it was like growing up in that rich cultural environment HERE.

Joanna maintains the birdfeeders, gardens and trails, coordinates housekeeping tasks and marketing, manages the office and handles most reservations.  When not occupied with inn-related responsibilities, she may be writing a mini-lesson for The Wired Word online curriculum, visiting with a college student, or attending a class to learn how to better serve guests or members of the church and community.  She loves to read, write, sing, design and lead worship, mentor students and teach.  She won a Twitter contest run by Drawthedog.com by writing a haiku, a couple of limericks, and assorted and sundry doggerel. You can read them here.

It was a happy surprise to learn that Joanna’s uncle, the Reverend Ernest Droppa, pastored the Norfolk and Raymondville United Methodist Churches many years ago.  His son Bob (Joanna’s cousin), a gourmet chef who travels the globe teaching cooking and business skills, remembers his years in Norfolk with great affection.   Maybe he’ll come back and cook for us sometime!

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