Lacourciere Paint Co – It's All About Family

It’s a new year and a new list of topics for 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks! We’ll see how it all works out, but hopefully, I can also get some subjects on my hit list written.

Week 1 Topic for 2025 is In the Beginning. I’ve written a post already about how I got involved in Ancestry so I’m taking this in a different direction. What better topic than my parents who started it all!

My mother, Elizabeth Ann Posluszny was born in 1922, and my father, John Steven Jakiela in 1924. They attended Lyman Hall High School together and my dad’s brother Walter was in my mother’s graduating class. I don’t know if they knew each other through their school years.

After high school, my mother went to Lauren Business School in Meriden and then went to work at Factory A of the International Silver Company. My dad worked at the Wallingford Steel Mill during high school and continued afterward until he headed to England in 1943. He returned to that job when he came home in 1945, and then he moved on to the paint store.

My mother and my dad’s sister Helen worked together at International Silver and belonged to a bowling league. My Auntie Helen told me that he would pick them up and drop off my mother at her home at 121 Clifton Street, and then he and Helen would go home. Auntie Helen realized something was happening when my dad started dropping her off first and then taking Betty home!

She also told me that “your mother said he’d better get off the pot and do something or she was moving on”. Suffice it to say they were married on November 9, 1952.

A little fun fact: Before their wedding, in January of 1952, John took a trip to Florida. I have an undocumented memory of him and his older brother Steve going there to see their brother Walter when he arrived stateside from wherever he had been. I wrote about him in March of 2024.

John sent some cute postcards to Betty while he was gone. He even put little notes under the stamps.

Betty was 30 on her wedding day and John was 28. Her mother was a widow and John lived with his oldest brother and his family so there was not likely a lot of money for a wedding but it was still beautiful. She had a timeless dress that was later worn by my sisters for their weddings. John and his groomsmen were in handsome morning suits.

*Steve Jakiela, John, Betty, and Tootsie Posluszny*

They left for a Florida honeymoon from the reception.

They lived in Meriden early in their marriage as Betty continued to work in the office at International Silver and John continued to work for Lacourciere Paint Company.

They hung around with John’s sister Helen and her future husband Ticker (Joseph) Jordan. They were married in May of 1953. They all loved to spend time at the Rocky Neck State Beach and vacation together in South Carolina.

They moved from Meriden to a cute rental on Carlton Street in Wallingford which was 2 blocks from her childhood home. Janice, Gail, and I were born when they were living there and we were likely busting out of the seams when we moved a year later to our beloved home at 15 Atkinson Lane.

Their marriage wasn’t perfect, but it worked for them. My dad loved having three girls and always said he wouldn’t want it any other way. He took us on bicycle and walking adventures and my mother instilled in us the love of reading.

They were the beginning of our family and the families my sisters and I created.

The topic for week 20 of 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks is – Taking Care of Business. I thought there was no better person to talk about than my dad, John Jakiela.

My dad graduated from high school in 1942. He was already working part time at the steel mill during high school and continued to do so until he headed to England during WWII.

When he came back to Wallingford, he returned to the steel mill for a brief time but said he was concerned about what he was breathing in so it was time to move on. He began working on a painting crew and that led him to working for The J. Lacourciere Paint Co. in Meriden and Wallingford Connecticut.

He worked on one of their painting crews and they painted and wallpapered hundreds of homes in Meriden and the surrounding area.

By the early 1950s, he was working in the Meriden store as a clerk.

There were 2 stores, one in Wallingford on Center Street at the current location of Cafe Luca and the Meriden store. The building the Meriden store was housed in was at 55 Grove Street in Meriden. It was an old brick building with very high decorative ceilings, a loft where the accounting was done, and an attic. Customers came in off the street through the front door and the back door – this old wood door with a bunch of locks – brought us in from the small parking lot in back. On the right side was the back of Firestone Tire which faced West Main Street and on the left side was the Capitol Theater. The theater was torn down for a parking garage in 1985 approximately.

While we were growing up, my dad worked Monday through Friday from 8 am to 5 pm. He had a half day on Wednesdays and worked Saturday mornings. He also worked until 8pm on Fridays. Every Friday he went to Verdolini’s for a pizza pie. He’d eat it on his dinner break and bring home the rest where my sister’s and I would fight over who got the left overs. I think there were usually 3 pieces left?

*Verdolini’s Pizza – my introduction to GOOD pizza*

I remember visiting the store and we would love to flip through the wallpaper sample books and all the tubes of paint in the art supplies. We’d pore over the paint sample stand and pick out our favorite colors. The year he made us a doll house we used the sample pages to wall paper the walls. We also used the pages to wrap bricks (yes, bricks) for door stops and book ends in the bookcases he built us.

In 1971, Clarence Lacourciere passed away at 69 years old. Then in 1973, Royal, the remaining brother managing the Meriden store passed away at age 75. I’m sure at this moment my parents had concerns about the future of my dad’s job. I don’t know how it came about, but my parent’s bought the store (the contents, and name) from the family and my dad ran the store as he had since 1951.

*Advertisements in the Record-Journal 1975* *and 1976*

In the Lacourciere family there was also a sister, Viola. I was doing my newspaper search for this story where I finally made the connection to “Viola L. Flynn”, a woman who sent us postcards from her trips, gave us Christmas gifts of pins (I still have a few!) and bracelets, and books. It was their sister! It was such a sweet surprise when I realized who she was.

As I mentioned, there was a Wallingford Lacourciere store and that was run by Oryle, a younger brother, born in 1911. Judging by the advertisement that Oryle and his wife printed in the newspaper, it looks like, to me, that they wanted to take advantage of the fact that the Meriden store was no longer owned by the Lacourciere family! Oryle closed his Wallingford store in 1980.

*Ad posted by Oryle Lacourciere after my dad bought the Meriden store*

My parents ran the store from 1975 until they made the decision to close the store in 1981. By the early 80s (or earlier), box stores made their way into the retail landscape and it was more convenient to buy paint there along with whatever other home improvement items you needed.

Since they didn’t own the building, just the contents, they sold off everything. He was friends with a local Wallingford Antique dealer, Red O’Connell, who came in and took anything he could sell at his barn.

Right around the time he decided to close the store, my dad saw and answered an ad for a painter/wall paperer at Gaylord Hospital and Rehabilitation in Wallingford. With his talent and years of experience, of course he got the job! He loved it. No more worries about bills, or getting broken into, which was a common occurrence. He was closer to home and with a golf course next door, he’d go out there on his lunch hour and pick up lost golf balls or maybe hit a few. An added bonus a few years later, was my sister Gail getting a job there. He could visit her every day in the Occupational Therapy department! But the day he turned 65 – he was done, retired! It was off to the golf course nearly every day and usually more than one round! Weekends he’d put his bicycle in the back of his truck and ride the roads and bike trails in Old Saybrook by the water.

But he didn’t put his talents to rest. Even while he was working at Gaylord, he took the framing machine from the paint store, set it up in the basement and started his picture framing business. He was so creative when it came to mats and colors and frames! I would always say “just do what you think is best!” A couple of years ago, we were at a house nearby looking at a kitchen remodel and the woman offered up furniture and pictures in her basement. We liked one picture and when my husband took it off the wall and I saw the back, I got so excited because – my father had framed it! His stamp was on the back!

My dad was an incredibly talented man. He was creative with colors and style. He remodeled our entire house (we helped with the demo!), and built our kitchen cabinets. His father was talented with wood and I think he was the only son who took after him. I’m glad he was able to continue the business, and was able to get such a good job to use his talents when he decided to close up. He was able to enjoy his retirement before his heart made other plans for him and he went to assisted living where he had another 9 or so years making friends, and probably running into former customers of the store.

He took care of business and had a great career in the painting, wallpaper, and framing business.

Tag: Lacourciere Paint Co

In The Beginning

The J. Lacourciere Paint Co.