Living Through Windows.. Featured Profiles

Name: Bob Bear
Diagnosis: Dementia
Time on Third Phillips: Almost one year
Branch of the military: Navy
Changes due to the disease: Bob was a constant hard worker both at work and at home, his wife, Shirley, said. While he now needs to be cared for, he's still pleasant to be around and misses her when she leaves.

Growing up in Fairbury, Bob Bear wasn't part of a gang of troublemaking youths, but to his soon-to-be wife, Shirley, it kind of seemed that way.

"They were all a little (wily)," Shirley said. "All of them were, all the Bears."

In the twilight of their marriage, Bob and Shirley see each other every day when she visits him on Third Phillips. An everyday hug was sometimes more than could be said during harvest season when Bob worked either on the railroad or as a director for the Nebraska Department of Roads and Shirley worked at a grain elevator.

The couple met when they were in college at Fairbury, and the young Bob delighted in taking her dancing. After a few dates, Shirley said, she "ended up loving him." They married, and when they first started their family, work and travel were a pretty big part of Bob's life.

"He came off the railroad because he was on the road all week long," Shirley said. "That's why he left, to be with the family."

Before the family came along, however, Bob was a Navy man during the Korean War, worked on teletype machines and served for four years. Upon returning, he and Shirley started their family, which was a priority for both.

Bob was pretty good at what he did, Shirley remembered, rising through the ranks of the Nebraska Department of Roads but always taking time to care about what was important. The couple had two children, one who works in health care and the other who owns First Holiday Tour and Travel.

"A lot of the times (with him) were really good," Shirley said. "He made the kids mind. He loved them."

He bled Husker red and Cardinal crimson during football and baseball seasons respectively, and Shirley said his personality didn't change all at once after she suspected something was wrong. When he was diagnosed with dementia, she wasn't surprised, but it was still difficult.

Now she gets to see her husband every day and have dinner with him. She even brings Bob's granddaughter Whitney up to Third Phillips, where she has become the unofficial mascot.

"She loves him," Shirley said. "Every night when she goes home, she gives him a hug and a kiss. He misses me if I don't come up. I miss him, too, I guess."