Vivian Benet

Vivian Benet-Kotala was born on March 24, 1920 in Dassel, Minnesota. She had thirteen siblings – two brothers and eleven sisters. Their names in chronological order are Vernon, Alvina, Sylvia, Viola, Martha, Mildred, Millard, Saimi, Ann, Vivian, Elaine, Delores, Shirley, Betty, and two half sisters, Esther and Selena.

Vivian’s dad, Jussi (John Erick) lived in Kotala, Finland above the Artic Circle. Her mom was Briita Liisa (Bertha) from Kemijarvi, Finland. Briita first met Jussi in church when she was 13. Jussi was 26 at the time and already married. When Briita laid eyes on him she said “I am going to marry that man.” After Jussi’s first wife Mary died, Jussi married Briita when she was 19. Briita’s parents gave them their choice of either land or passage to America for their wedding present. In 1903, they chose to come to America. They moved to Minnesota with Vernon, Esther and Selena. They chose to homestead in Minnesota because the terrain and climate were similar to Finland and there was a large Finnish populace. The Minneapolis area became their hub for farming and raising the children. The family celebrated the Lutheran religion. Britta gave massages to supplement their limited income. When someone had an ailment, she would take a straightedge raiser and slash the skin at the wound site. Britta would take a cow horn, cut the tip off, place it on the wound, suck out the impure blood, and spit the blood into an old fashioned washtub. In Finnish this was called “kuppamaan” which means “bloodletting.”

Vivian loved her childhood! One of her favorite memories was her amazing garden with beautiful vegetables – this bountiful garden became her artist’s palette. The garden was next to the road and the “city folk” drove by and stopped to admire the garden. They asked Briita for some of the veggies and she would always give them away. Vivian was heartbroken because the family’s own dinner table was sorely lacking in fresh produce.

Vivian also told stories of the times she would go down to the cellar to partake the pleasures of the crop of fermenting grapes! During the depression years, her half sister Esther made sure each sister received a precious doll. Also, she often talked about the Kelly boys (her cousins).

Vivian and her siblings walked a long distance to attend a one room schoolhouse daily. The Kotala children were smart…so smart that their intelligence intimidated the teachers. Some of the girls became tutors for the other children in the one room school. Their lunch box consisted of a molasses tin can with a sorghum (a corn derivative) sandwich inside. Mom often talked about the intimidating boys who chased the Kotala sisters home from school. Her father was extremely protective and would threaten the boys for chasing the Kotala girls. To remedy the situation, the teachers held the boys back to allow the girls to get an adequate head start home.

During the depression, mom’s parents lost their farm because “the banker did them wrong and took the farm away.” The children were split up to live in different homes because John and Britta couldn’t afford to keep them all together. Mom was heartbroken. Initially she lived in the country with a childless couple who treated her like their very own daughter. Though she was well taken care of, she was still homesick. When it was time for high school Mom moved to the city to live with a Greek family in order to attend West High School in Minneapolis. There wasn’t a high school in the country where she had been living. The family owned a restaurant and would divvy out the food for their own children, yet little was left for mom. The high school principal called mom into the office wondering why her grades were so poor. She simply responded with, “I am hungry.” The principal interrogated the “mean” family which resulted in an unpleasant outcome for Mom.

After high school, Mom left the Greek family and went to live in Chicago. It was soon after the move that her sister Ann asked Vivian to come to live with her in New York City. She jumped at the opportunity and found work at a bank. The move to the city was advantageous and would later prove life-changing.

One day, while in transit on the subway to go home, she noticed a handsome, young man eyeing her. He was delighted in her youthful and stunning beauty, blonde hair, and fair skin. When they exited the train “coincidentally” at the same stop, Dad followed Mom up to the street level. At the red light, he looked at her hand and saw no ring. He quickly grasped her hand and said, “No ring, you are going to be my wife!” –“Oh the nerve!” Mom thought. He followed her to her apartment without invitation. Mom told the elevator man, “Don’t let this man up the elevator.” Dad cunningly saw the elevator stop at the 4th floor. He ran up the stairs and knocked on every door on the 4th floor searching for that youthful, blonde haired and stunningly beautiful maiden he saw on the train.

A knock on one door revealed Vivian. However, an uninvited man received an unwelcomed response - “Go away or I’ll call the police!” Dad went to his mother’s house and returned to Vivian’s with his mother’s prized chicken soup to gain her favor. Dad went to the communal room and brought back silverware and bowls and they shared the chicken soup…a sheer delicacy for a young woman surviving on doughnuts and coffee. A season or two later on Christmas Eve in 1942, Uncle Maurice and Aunt Aline went to city hall and witnessed Vivian’s marriage to Raymond Benet. They went to Luchow’s for dinner but all they could afford was a cup of coffee. Soon after, the two hopped on board a train full of soldiers heading for Miami to begin their honeymoon. After spending just over a week in Florida, they returned to New York City to start their life together.

Vivian received a scholarship to attend Columbia University. Although her dream was to become a journalist, she instead chose to start a family, which boosted her into a highly creative phase as a homemaker. Bountiful home-made dinners and pies poured out of her kitchen to delight relatives on Sundays. Lavish home décor at Christmas kept the Santa tradition alive. Beautiful clothing was whipped out of her sewing machine for her three little girls and the navy-blue coats and matching leggings with the little beret were especially well remembered. After years of new outfits, the clothing won places in their hearts, especially the green calico dress with tan smock. Her home had become her creative factory outlet.

Mom conversed on the telephone daily for an hour or two with her sister Delores. The three daughters would listen hoping to catch an “earful”. However, Mom always switched to speaking Finnish as a secret code to let us know that we weren’t invited!

Mom’s practical business side manifested at Empire State Typewriter Company to do the bookkeeping while Dad would be talking on three lines at the same time to do sales. After retirement from the typewriter company, Mom was able to attend school in Palm Beach, Florida in her 50’s where they lived half time. They sold their place in Forest Hills, NY and Susan cried her eyes out as they said goodbye to her in her driveway. They bought their condominium in Palm Beach before following their girls to Colorado, where they subsequently spent their summers and falls.

While in Florida after retirement, Mom was able to turn her creative expression into oil painting. Dino Simonelli, was her art teacher and mentor. With his guidance and inspiration she was prolific and produced some of her best artwork. She won many awards and first place ribbons for her paintings. When Dino committed suicide, Mom was heartbroken. Mom had enough college credits to earn a degree but all her classes were in art so she didn’t qualify. Her instructor Ruben Hale at Palm Beach Community College took one of her paintings away and said, “When you become a famous artist I will have this painting of yours.” The painting may still be hanging in the office of the head of the art department.

Mom had a one woman art show in an art gallery in Palm Beach. Her paintings displayed vibrant colors of lavenders, purples, and blues. Her trademark became her brush strokes and a mysterious mood that emanated from each canvas. A group of aspiring artists, including Vivian, were so desperate for a place to paint. They found an old building called the Armory which was adorned by pigeon droppings. So the group of artists banded together, cleaned it up, and made the Amory their creative nest. Mom donated funds as a founder of the Armory school.

Besides Mom’s artwork, she was a healer by heart. She read many articles on nutrition and preventive medicine from her enormous collection of books. She spent her days reading, painting, and walking on the beach or sidewalk while in Florida and hiking along the trails and roads, or entertaining grandchildren and daughters while in Colorado. In her later years, she gave up painting because she couldn’t paint according to her own expectations and standards. Instead, she would admire her artwork and spend hours doing Sudoku puzzles at the kitchen table. Her relationship with Dad deepened during this time as dinner with Dad became the highlight of her day. It was during this later age that the family began to develop stronger relationships and family ties due to annual family cruises to Alaska and the Caribbean. Everyone exulted in being able to see Grandma and Grandpa during the vacations, seemingly more of a rarity for the grandchildren as the two began to solely call Florida home since 2003.

On March 15, 2010, Mom and Dad arrived to Colorado by train after three full days of travel. Passing through Washington D.C. and Chicago, the rail travel allowed for a visit to Bryan’s new family. After Dad passed in May, Mom spent hours sitting at Susan’s roundtable in the dining room completing Sudoku puzzles, watching birds, squirrels and deer. Her imagination soared when she saw the faces in the rocks near the waterfall, just outside the dining room window.

One day Shari took Mom on a journey into the mountains. They went onto a curvy road that was climbing in elevation. Shari wanted to turn around but Mom said “I’m not dead yet, you keep going!” She was in awe about the clouds, the mountains, and the shimmering, dancing leaves. At 11,500 feet at Echo Lake, Mom marched into the lodge to have coffee, dessert, and delight in watching the hummingbirds. On the return trip, Mom insisted that we go a different route to see something new and different.

A week before Mom passed into her spiritual journey, her sister Shirley, arrived into town. Mom’s week with her was spent reminiscing, full of laughs, girl-talking over pajama parties, wonderful dinners, and going to the art museum and enjoying yoga.

On her last day at Susan’s house, Monday June, 28th, Mom was so excited because a deer was raiding the bird feeders. Mom’s newfound friend Dolly was chasing after the deer and Mom was saying “Leave the deer alone and allow the deer to freely graze.” While sitting at the roundtable that morning, Dolly saw Mom take a break from her daily Sudoku puzzle and mark the calendar for three days away: Thursday, July 1st – “Raymond’s Birthday (92 yrs).” Later that afternoon, Mom chose to go for a massage with Susan over getting her nails done. She shopped at a few boutiques by the massage place and stood looking at all the clothes. Then they went for the massage and returned home feeling rather tired. It was minutes later that Vivian needed to go to the hospital. It would later prove that there was no way that Raymond’s beautiful birthday date would be missing on his 92nd. Vivian Kotala-Benet passed on Wednesday, June 30th at 4:55 a.m. to rejoin her husband, Raymond Benet, the day before his birthday.