Chapter 1 “What’s in a name…”
My name is Vikki Jo Stewart but, it wasn’t always that simple! Mother named me Vikki Jo Crook after my birth father, Victor Joseph. He was adopted at the age of one and his birth name was Harry Savage. She divorced him a short time later married my stepfather, Dale George. Just after the marriage they told Kathy and me that we were now Vikki and Kathy George. I was almost four and Kathy was 18 months old. Think about it, Vikki and Kathy Crook ceased to exist (on paper) and Vikki and Kathy George attended K-12 without birth certificates! Not really a problem until I graduated from high school and started working on my first ‘real’ job. The job for the city of El Dorado required identification in the form of a…wait for it…birth certificate. I produced a certified copy of my birth certificate and explained my renaming expecting that it would all be okay. Well, it wasn’t okay and I had to go to court to change my last name legally to George. As luck would have it the only attorney I knew was a sponsor for a club I was active in at Butler Community College — People-to-People! Erwin Grant was a kind and gentle character and agreed to represent me. He explained that it was fairly simple and straight forward. I’d have to publish a two week notice saying I was changing my name in the local paper, a different county in Kansas paper, and a paper out of state AND it would cost $187. So the notices were published and a court date was set. The morning of the hearing Grant told me the process is quick and easy. He’d ask me why I wanted to change my name and I’d respond then the judge would bang the gavel and pronounce that I was Vikki Jo George. I remember thinking, it’s $187, I have to do something…
It’s important to the story that I add another character, the judge. I worked as a soda jerk after school at Clark’s Drug store in downtown El Dorado my last three years of high school. Most days a few minutes before 4 pm I would stir chocolate syrup into a glass of milk (called a 400 on the menu), set the glass on the counter, give a stool a hard swing in time for Judge Darling to walk through the door for his afternoon 400! On the court day a few folks were in the court room as my attorney, Judge Darling and I prepared to begin. After the swearing in, Erwin asked me why I wanted to change my name. I responded I wanted to change my name to “Goosey.” The color drained from Grant’s face. I continued to share that I was engaged to Jimmy Horney and that my intention was that the announcement in the paper would read Goosey/Horney vows. Judge Darling hid his mouth and there was laughter in the courtroom. Then I said, OR I want to change my last name to my stepfather’s — George — and be Vikki Jo George so I could get paid and be legal. Judge Darling banged the gavel and said So Ordered, you are Vikki Jo George.
NOTE: My sister Kathy did not change her name until she married John Peek. There was some confusion when the minister and her marriage license and certificate all said Donna Kathleen Crook!
My first marriage to Ron Moore lasted 15 years (5 happy) and added another name/identity.
What’s in a name? Well, I thought of myself as:
Vikki Jo Savage Crook George Moore Stewart!
I grew up feeling my identity was fractured. That could account for some of my behavior in the late 6O’s! On a positive note, over 37 years ago I married George R. Stewart thus becoming Vikki Jo Stewart. I owned the name and it meant the end of feeling fractured. I was like the Velveteen Rabbit, I became real!
Becoming real is another chapter!
