Campton Hills artist recounts life of second chances

CAMPTON HILLS – A late afternoon sun reflected off the snow and filled Bill Roxworthy's small Campton Hills art studio with its pale glow.

Roxworthy held his latest rural watercolor up, studying it for flaws. His favorite subjects are old barns and farms.

"I always wanted to be an artist," said Roxworthy, 63. "There's a lot of art in the blood. It came very naturally to me. But my dad said, 'Don't be an artist, there's no money in it.' He was right unless you're one of the chosen few, like Norman Rockwell."

So when Roxworthy left a successful three-decade career in publishing and advertising sales at age 49, his daughter bought him a watercolor set.

"I started goofing around with it. Then I opened my own studio, and I have a new career as a watercolorist," Roxworthy said. "I have done commissioned work for people. This will be the first year my work will be going to juried shows."

But this second career is an echo of a string of second chances throughout his life – being orphaned as a teenager, surviving a helicopter crash and Agent Orange in Vietnam – the latest is surviving stage 4 throat cancer.

"I am so grateful," he said. "I am really lucky."



Serving in Vietnam

The youngest of six children, Roxworthy's mother died of cancer when he was 12. His father killed himself when Roxworthy was 15.

An orphan, he lived with his oldest brother, who is 21 years older. He went to college at 17 on a football scholarship, dropped out at 19 to join the Army and was sent to Germany.

"It was very racial. I could not have a friend of another color or there would be a fight," Roxworthy said. "I could be friends with a black guy in the barracks, but if you went to the wrong bar [with him] you got jumped. I went to my captain and said, 'I have to get out of here. I can't take this.' "

The captain told him the only way out was to join a little conflict in southeast Asia. Roxworthy said he'd go.

"I could not find Vietnam on a map," Roxworthy said. "But I was the perfect candidate to go to war. I was young and strong and [angry] at the world about my childhood. They could not have picked a better guy. If 30-years-olds fought wars, there would be no wars because no one would go."

Roxworthy served two tours of duty from October 1967 to May 1969. Because of the spread of years among brothers in his family, his oldest brother served in World War II and another brother served in Korea.

"I was in Vietnam one month, and I knew it was a mistake," he said. "The people there really did not want to help themselves. They were like, 'We'll suck up all your money and provide hookers and other vices.'  But when it comes to combat ... when forced to participate, they were very ineffective."



Marriage and career

In the midst of his war time misery, Roxworthy still loved his girl back home in Barrington Hills, where they grew up. Nancy Jean Mack was a niece to the late Sen. Eugene McCarthy. Roxworthy said he fell in love with her when she was 14.

"I wrote her that I was going to Hawaii for R and R," Roxworthy said. "When I got there, she was standing on the tarmac. I was 20, and she was 18. Three days later we were married. It was going to be a secret, but we blew our cover because she immediately got pregnant."

Everyone predicted the marriage would not last, not only because they were so young, but because he is conservative and his wife is a liberal Democrat.

"But here we are, 43 years later," Roxworthy said. "She is the best person in the world. I send her flowers every month."

After his second tour of duty, he came home to an 8-week-old boy he had never seen. Two more children would follow, all three 11 months apart from each other.

"I had babies ... no career, and I had to get moving," Roxworthy said. "I went to Michigan Avenue and told them I had a degree in marketing. I just made it up."

He worked in publishing and advertising for 33 years. Among the publications he worked for was Cosmopolitan, the first year Helen Gurley Brown was publisher; Mechanix Illustrated; Better Homes and Gardens; Field & Stream; and selling sponsorship rights for the most valuable player sports awards.

Ski magazine was the best job, allowing him to retire at 49.

The family raised its children in St. Charles, then moved to Campton Hills 12 years ago to a three-acre parcel with big trees that reminds him of the farms of his youth.



Fighting cancer

Roxworthy smoked Marlboro cigarettes for 40 years before quitting in 2005. He said he always knew he would get cancer from the habit he developed in Vietnam.

"I was the 'Marlboro man,' " Roxworthy said, noting the irony. "Marlboro was also one of my biggest clients."

In 2009, he developed a dry cough while golfing with his son in California. When he came home, he coughed up blood. His wife works at Delnor Hospital in Geneva as a medical technician and head of its blood bank, so that's where he went for a diagnosis and eventually treatment.

"They found it in my throat right away, a stage 4 and a half," Roxworthy said. "That's just below 'you're done.' The tumor was under my tongue. It went through the tonsil on my left side and under the jawbone and into my left lymph node in my neck. That's big trouble."

That became his summer of radiation and chemotherapy, winding up with surgery to remove his lymph nodes.

"I had the best team of doctors that saved my life," he said. "The treatment killed the tumor."

But it also nearly killed him in the process.

"On a scale of 1 to 10, the pain was a 12. It hurt to drink water," Roxworthy said. "I'm no wimp. I never had man or beast bring me to my knees, but this did. I asked God either to cure me or kill me because I could not take the pain. Cancer is the most insidious disease on the planet."

But he wanted to live. And live he does, happy with his wife, his art, three grown children and now 10 grandchildren.

"I raised my family to truly understand that family is the most important thing in life – family and real friends," Roxworthy said. "I could have gone the one way or the other way. With the help of my wife and friends, I went the right way. I am very lucky."