Hazell Way

I don’t know where that second “l” came from, but this street honors Hazel Margaret Bilton (1925-2014), whose father Percy Bilton built the San Gabriel Village tract on this location in 1938. “Hazey” was born in England, educated in Pasadena, and provided civilian assistance in London during WWII. There she met her first husband, an American soldier named George Ray Lyon Jr., whom she married in 1946. They lived in South Africa for many years, then settled in Santa Barbara. When Percy Bilton died in 1983, leaving his three children with an exorbitant inheritance, Hazey spent her golden years in style. After George Lyon’s death, she married her second husband Bill Farrell – and outlived him as well.