Historical April 1992 article. Dates, prices, services and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
This is not an obituary.
This is just an article that I’ve been meaning to write for about a year now but was only reminded to do so by the recent death of the heroine. Lillian Buckhalter died Sunday, March ’15 in a fire in her efficiency apartment, on the backside of the onestory apartment building at Des Peres and Washington.
A detective was quoted in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, referring to Lillian as a “pack rat” and expressing astonishment at her collection of “more than 300 pairs of shoesmost of which didn’t fit her.” I wonder how he knew that, and if he ever saw the creative ways in which Lillian wore her shoes. Evidently, her apartment was packed floor to ceiling, wall to wall, with things she had found here and there. Lillian was more than a collector of things the rest of us threw away, and that is the focus of this piece. Lillian was in charge of my alley, the one between Washington and Westminster. She. knew every inch of the territory, ‘not only from her search for treasures but also from her efforts to keep it as clean as she could.
A small broom, with most of the strands worn down to nubs, and two specially fashioned sticks were her tools. One stick had a nail in the end so that items were more easily retrieved, while the other had an assortment of rags attached, making cleaning behind and beside the dumpsters an easier chore. Lillian was out there every day, working hard to keep the leaves and trash from sullying the alley.
In the heat of summer she wore a thick wool coat, claiming it kept her just as cool as could be.
She could not manage the refrigerators and old dryers people have a habit of leaving in our alley, but everything else she assumed as her personal responsibility.
If you stopped long enough to speak with her, Lillian would mention that keeping the alley nice was her mission, her calling.
She called herself a preacher you see, and if you went by the back of the apartments at just the right time you could see her extolling the wonders of the world and shaking her hands in the air to a throng of worshiping pigeons.
In fact, when Lillian pulled food from the dumpsters she would explain that it was for the pigeons. Lillian wore a necklace made of hundreds of keys she had found.
It looked heavy, but very authoritative, as she patrolled the premises.
She once told me that she had been living a life of sin, until one night she was awakened in the midst of a deep sleep to Jesus knocking loudly on her nightstand.
He held an open bible, and inside it was a single key, and he told her to repent, to turn around, and to preach the word.
She took the call, and has followed the Lord ever since.
If you lingered too long in the alley, Lillian would make sure you got your daily dose of gospel, too.
As to the 300 pairs of shoes, Lillian did walk the alley all day. Shoes that were too large were easily adapted by lacing them further up your shin than most shoes go. Shoes that were too small could be “extended” by use of carefully placed slits and duct tape. Last summer I guiltily discarded a pair of Nike hightops that had a ripped eyelet and were no longer supportive enough for aerobics only to see Lillian sporting them the very next day. .Lillian’s life was by no means without difficulty.
She had been hit by a car (deliberately, she thought) and often seemed hungry or cold. Hopelessly bored kids would sometimes taunt her, grabbing at the plastic bags she used to transport her findings and calling names. She’d defend herself by swinging her sticks around her until she cleared a space. and the kids would eventually grow bored of this activity too. Lillian was one of those people you could either be scared of, because they are different from you or anyone you’ve ever known (or at least it seems that way), or you could come to love her presence in the neighborhood, the important role she played. Our neighborhood will remember Lillian.
When Operation Blitz entices us all into the alley for one day of the kind of. thing she spent each day doing, we become acutely aware of what we throw away.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, April 1992.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1992_04.pdf, printed page(s) 6; PDF page(s) 6.
