A source has clarified the situation with the St Mary's rectory and where Bishop Willars had his deathbed. As I'd mentioned in yesterday's post, the St Mary's rectory is tiny, and it was difficult to imagine Fr Wilcox (described to me as 6'3", 320 pounds), his wife, and a terminally ill patient sharing those quarters, and I was right. Bishop Willars was in fact set up in an office area at the rear of the parish basement proper, adjoining the rectory via a breezeway. That office later became the parish library. My source doesn't know if Willars actually passed away in that space, but he spent most of his final confinement there.
Regarding the rectory, my source continues,
The cotttage behind the church was never in use as a rectory [uring most of the Wilcoxs's tenure]. . . . The parish rented a house about 6-doors to the west on Finley, on the opposite side of the street[.] This was the rectory for many years. When the owner sold it[,] the Wilcoxes moved briefly to a condo in Glendale[, and then they decided] to be frugal and live in the tiny cottage. The Wilcoxes lived in the Finley rectory at the time of Bishop Willars's death.
