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I have been trying to find information about my Great Uncle Bill and on a whim I jumped on my motorbike and made a day-trip to Waco.. William Mitchell Wood left Aberdeen as a teen and after landing in New York and working in a restaurant he ended up in Waco sometime in the early 1920′s. He married  Jody (Judy) Jewel Allen in Dallas in 1925. He owned the Tam O’Shanter Hotel Courts a motel very close to what is now I-35 at the infamous Waco Circle – one of Texas’ few roundabouts!

Tam O'Shanter Motel, Waco

The spare ribs sold at Bill Wood’s Famous Foods were fabulous enough to be included in a Ford Motor Almanac with recipes from restaurants all over America. I’ll make them one of these days.

Elite Circle Grill

The Elite Circle Grill was a contemporary restaurant of Bill’s situated exactly opposite his on The Circle. There was an old aerial photograph of the Elite on the wall and you can see the Tam O’Shanter quite clearly. This is how the Elite looks today – I stopped there for lunch.

Elite Circle Grill Chili

This chili was very good. I had read about the grill and because it has been around from the 20′s I assumed it might have some old diner type waitresses. Sadly not – it was renovated a couple of years ago and is now a typical ‘American’ type grill with a very young staff. Not a beehive in sight.

As I was leaving I saw an elderly couple walking to their car so I asked them if they remembered the Tam O’Shanter across the road. It turned out that the woman had spent the night before her wedding there with her sister and other pals. They both enjoyed eating at his restaurant but did not remember him.

A few minutes south of The Circle is Waco Memorial Park where Bill & Judy are buried. A very friendly employee at the park looked in the records and personally took me to the grave site. Thank God he did – over 30,000 people are buried there “and more each day” I was cheerily told!

I was just three years old when Uncle Bill died, but I remember my Nana getting a check every month from Waco which only stopped when she died. Apparently he visited Aberdeen once and promenaded down the road in a linen suit and a cowboy hat and boots. He was well known in Waco for being one of the founding members of the Baylor Bears booster club. They used to put on a rodeo to raise money and he would be all dolled up as a cowboy hootin’ and hollerin’ with his Aberdeen accent!

We did not have the Intertubes in 1984 when I emigrated to America otherwise I maybe would have tried to find Bill & Judy I certainly was aware of them. His obituary has no mention of children. However somebody has been placing flowers on the grave. I suppose I have some distant relatives down there and would love to meet them. Maybe somebody will Google their names and find this.

Uncle Bill also owned at least two, maybe three, Triple XXX Root Beer franchises. I was told one was at 15th and Maple so I headed over there and found the building above that I imagined at some time could have been a drive-up.  It is now a charismatic church. On the wall is printed “Where everybody is somebody.”

For a teenager from the Highlands of Scotland Great Uncle Bill surely realised the American Dream and made a somebody of himself. I would have loved to meet him.