Two-time cancer survivor, garden center owner gives back

Bill Van Wilgen, the owner of Van Wilgen's Garden Center in North Brandford, Conn., was profiled by the city's local newspaper on Father's Day because Van Wilgen, a two-time cancer survivor, was able to spend the holiday with his new granddaughter, thanks to the generosity of a bone marrow donor. Van Wilgen is now raising money for the cancer center that treated him by selling a classic pink yard ornament. A portion of the article is included below. Visit the New Haven Register for the full story. 

NORTH BRANFORD -- Father’s Day is especially special for one North Branford grandfather and business owner who twice has battled cancer and won.

Bill Van Wilgen, owner of Van Wilgen’s Garden Center on Valley Road, will spend Sunday enjoying his first Father’s Day with his 8-month-old granddaughter Nora, but it hasn’t always been an enjoyable holiday for him. On Father’s Day in 2008 he hadn’t been feeling well for a while, he said, and he felt so poorly that day that he ended up in the emergency room.

And he soon got the diagnosis: leukemia — this after having completed a successful battle against male breast cancer that started six years earlier.

Read the rest of the story on the New Haven Register.