Joanne and Ed photos

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Joanne Elizabeth Lubowiecki was born on September 16, 1927, at home in New Hyde Park to parents Kinga and Leon Lubowiecki. Her godparents were John Gozelski and Mary G. Gaieski. Her name was Johanna, but she legally changed it to Joanne. Her siblings called her “Sis”.

Joanne was very ill with scarlet fever before there were antibiotics and almost died at three-years-old. The illness left her completely deaf in one ear and only partial hearing in the other. She attended St. Hedwig’s school briefly, but the nuns would not accommodate hearing disabilities. So, she finished her primary education at New Hyde Park Road School.

She continued her secondary education at Sewanhaka High School but did not take the beauty culture program there. After high school, she worked at the Long Island Lighting Company (LILCO) for a time. She then attended beauty school in Hempstead and got a job at a beauty salon in Baldwin, taking the bus to and from New Hyde Park.

She later worked as a beautician at her sister Virginia's beauty salon in New Hyde Park until the birth of her daughter Betty Jane.

Joanne died on May 21, 2015, in New York and is buried with her husband at Holy Rood Cemetery in Westbury, New York.

Ed Sawicki

Edward Joseph Sawicki Sr. was born on August 17, 1928 in Mineola Hospital to parents Stanislaw and Franciska Sawicki. He had two older brothers: Peter and Paul. He had two older sisters: Sophie and Veronica. Veronica died at age two.

He went to Garden City Park School, followed by Sewanhaka High School. He had to leave Sewanhaka before graduating because he had to take care of his sick mother who had breast cancer.

In his tenage years, he worked at the Wheatley Hills Golf Club. He told stories of taking his friends for wild rides in a greenskeeping wagon (a vehicle with most of the body removed) around the golf course.

Edward met Joanne at the St Hedwigs Catholic Youth Organization in 1947. They were married on May 15, 1949 at St Hedwigs Church in Floral Park, NY. The reception was at the New Hyde Park Polish Home (now The Elks Club) and had 225 people.

Ed worked his adult life in the milk industry starting with Clover Dairy in Garden City Park. The dairy moved to Glen Head in the mid-1960s.

Ed started a home handyman service sometime in the early 1960s. Note the phone number. That was when the telephone system still used named exchanges (PI was short for Pioneer).

He had a part-time job for many years repairing and painting racetrack sulkies at Nassau Bicycle Shop in Mineola, NY. Sulkies are lightweight carts used for harness racing. It has two wheels and a small seat for a single driver. Harness racing was a popular sport at Roosevelt Raceway in Westbury, NY up until it ended in 1988.

Ed was the life of the party at gatherings of family and friends. Joanne's family called him “Timber” because of his height, and his son Ed Jr was nicknamed “Twig”. Ed Jr still gets called Twig by the Gozelski clan in upstate New York.

One of the rites of passage for the Sawicki children (once they were old enough) was to water ski from Hempstead Harbor, Long Island across the Long Island Sound to Rye, New York. This was a distance of about 7 miles. Plus, most of them did the return trip as well for a total of 14 miles.

Skiing the Sound was fatiguing because there were waves and there was often quite a bit of other marine traffic.

Ed always said he was going to “go out” (die) dancing. He had a heart attack dancing the polka at a wedding and was taken to Cemtral General Hospital in Plainview, NY. He died a few days later on September 28, 1993 at age 65. He is buried with Joanne at Holy Rood Cemetery in Westbury, New York.