June Dillon Passed Away Today
At the Lions Club meeting tonight, I learned from Don Mills that June Dillon passed away earlier today from some form of cancer. My family and hers lived across the street from each other during the early 1970s on North Third Street in Bellwood, and as a boy, I had a crush on Mrs. Dillon because she could play the organ so well; she used to do songs I liked when I’d visit her daughters, which at that time, were elementary schoolmates of mine besides. She invited my sisters and I over to watch Batman on their color television now and then, as we only had black and white at our house, and she knew how much we enjoyed seeing the shows in color. Then we’d sit around her and her organ afterwards, and be mesmerized by the complex yet intricate melodies that flowed from her fingers. Anyone that could play like June was a queen in my book, as I loved music then as I do now, and idolized anyone who could make it sound as good as she did.
In fact, I’d said to [Emmy] a couple years ago that we should visit June and have her play for us. I think their organ was a Hammond B3 (or something that sounded very much like the B3), and as [Emmy] and I are big fans of music in which the B3 was used, we really wanted to visit and have June show us what every lever, button, knob, and key did. However, June’s been sick for a long time, as has Mom. So we never got down to see the Dillons, though had Mom felt better, she would have taken us, and I think June would have enjoyed seeing me after over thirty years.
Anyway, I just wanted to say to June, thanks for all the music and wonderful childhood memories, for it was your playing that got me interested in the B3, and is largely why today, I’m a huge organ music fan. You could play that instrument every bit as well as the musicians I’d heard on the radio, who were cranking out the big B3 hits in the sixties and seventies. You could have made the hits as well if you had ever followed that path. But actually, I’m glad that you decided to stick around our small town and raise a family; else, I’d have never heard you play, live, in your living room. Do rest in peace, June.