Written in Blood Page 7

  It was a loving and very Catholic family. They all went to confession on Saturday and services on Sunday at St. John Vianney, their parish church. It was housed in a historic building on Old Boston Post Road. In a previous life, the structure served as a tavern where travelers stopped for refreshment on their way to Boston.

  Easter was a special day in the McKee home. Beforehand, the family dressed in nice clothes, as many did for shopping in that era, and traveled to Woonsocket to buy new dresses, hats, gloves and shoes for the special day. When the big morning arrived, Elizabeth prepared them for the service one girl at a time, starting with her youngest, Margaret. She tied each head of hair with rags to create the long, fat sausage curls so popular on little ones at the time, and dressed them in their new outfits.

  One Easter, she had groomed her two youngest girls to perfection and waited on Betty Ann to finish her bath in the tub. Rosemary, the middle child, came into the bathroom to see her older sister. Somehow, she managed to tumble head first into the soapy water. She emerged with a wet dress, a soggy hat and her former curls hanging like dishrags on her head. Mom did double duty at top speed to make up for lost time. The family barely squeaked into church before the services began.

  Christmas was celebrated with family togetherness, religious observance and exuberant glee. There were not a lot of presents, but each one was selected with care and deemed by the sisters to be perfect. And always, there were beautiful dolls from the nuns decked out in elaborate crocheted outfits.

  All five members of the family made an excursion a couple of days before Christmas each year to shop for the tree. As soon as they were home, the decoration began. One year, the group trekked out into the woods, where Harold chopped down a tree and lugged it back home. It was a twisted, Charlie Brown Christmas kind of tree, but the girls loved it just the same.

  Christmas morning, the first one to wake up would rouse her sisters. Betty Ann, Rosemary and Margaret tip-toed down to the tree and gazed at it and the packages beneath its branches. They tried to contain their excitement, but it bubbled out of them like soda from an agitated can. Full of unabated anticipation, they raced to their parents’ bedroom, where they begged and pleaded until Elizabeth and Harold relented and got out of bed.

  Later, the family would travel up a winding road on a steep hill to visit with the Provincial Sisters at their convent to thank them for their dolls. After a polite social interval, they would troop into the chapel and give their thanks to God. It was a pleasant annual ritual, but the young girls were always eager to complete the pilgrimage and go back home to play with their toys.

  In addition to the fun of Christmas, the winter season brought massive quantities of snow to New England. The drifts were so high, the girls could burrow caves in their depths and build impregnable forts where they crawled and climbed for hours.

  The girls all enjoyed ice-skating on the nearby pond. But best of all, they loved it when their dad pulled out the toboggan and took them all for a ride. They wedged on, one behind the other and soared down one hill, up another, then down the second hill and back to the house. Always the little voices demanded another hairraising descent. They never wanted to go back inside.

  When they were finally coaxed in from their winter wonderland, they piled their rubber boots by the door and laid their sopping wet mittens on the radiator. Soon, the air was filled with the peculiar earthy smell of wool overheating as it dried.

  Unlike little Margaret, who was content to roam the hills with just her dog for company, Betty Ann craved the companionship of others. A constant stream of her friends flowed through the doors of the McKee home. Her younger sisters remembered many rides in the car to deliver Betty Ann to friends who lived twenty or thirty minutes away.

  Betty Ann kicked off her teenage years in her typical gregarious fashion—with a Halloween party planned with elaborate care. In the dark basement of their old home, candles flickered in corners. The gaggle of giggling, screaming children grabbed hold of the ropes strung downstairs to guide them through the murky labyrinth. They stopped at stations set up along the way, where a gruesome story spilled out one body part at a time.

  They felt the bowl of eyeballs—in actuality a bunch of peeled grapes. They held the severed hand—a rubber glove filled with Jell-O. And stuck their hands deep into the bowl of brains—a container of cold spaghetti. It was a delightful and spooky night filled with mock horror.

  After the squeals subsided, Father John Randall, the priest at the Novitiate, judged the costumes. Margaret, disguised as a fairy princess, won first place.

  When she entered her teens, Betty Ann developed a real love for automobiles and the freedom they represented. Her father, who sold Ford cars for the National Motor Company in Woonsocket, often thrilled her by driving home new models. If he came to the house with a convertible, Betty Ann insisted on a photo session as she posed beside the car and behind the wheel.

  A natural love for children led Betty Ann into a lucrative baby-sitting business—at fifty cents an hour, she was not getting rich, but it did provide the spending money a teenager always craved. She did so well caring for the kids that some of her clientele would cancel their plans for the evening if they found out she was not available.

  Often, she baby-sat the two sons, Peter and Bob Farrelly, of a doctor and his wife. These two brothers grew up to write and direct hysterical Hollywood hits like Kingpin, Dumb and Dumber and Something About Mary.

  Betty Ann’s high level of creativity screamed for expression. Everyone who crossed her path became the subject of one of her charcoal sketches. Her musical talent was astonishing. She started piano lessons at an early age on the family’s upright piano. For her 16th birthday, her parents gave her a baby grand. Any song she ever heard she could repeat with ease and grace.

  But her musical skill did not stop with the piano. Throughout her life, she had the ability to master any instrument that came her way. She often played the organ for benediction on Monday nights at the parish church. She loved sitting on her stool, singing folk songs as she accompanied herself on her Martin guitar. Her favorite pieces were the ones she had heard Joan Baez sing. She played at many gigs on campuses and in coffee shops during and after college.

  Throughout her teenage years, a yearning grew inside of Betty Ann. Like George Bailey of It’s a Wonderful Life, she was consumed by a passion to travel to foreign lands, to learn the cultures of different people, to escape from “the sticks.” Although many found contentment in such a peaceful, pastoral childhood in New England, to Betty Ann the tranquility was like a prison.

  Nonetheless, she dutifully attended nearby Salve Regina College, the college by the sea, in Newport, Rhode Island. The school was chartered by the State of Rhode Island in 1934 and founded as an institution by the Sisters of Mercy. Established as an independent school in the Catholic tradition of education, this co-ed college did not begin to accept students until 1947 when it acquired Ochre Court, a limestone French Flamboyant Gothic palace. The first class of fifty-eight students attended all their classes in this mansion with its high roofs, turrets and whimsical gargoyles. The opulent building now houses the school’s administrative offices.

  When she entered the school in 1960, the enrollment at the college was less than five hundred. She had left “Betty Ann” at home. She introduced herself as Liz McKee to all of her new friends.

  14

  After college, Liz landed her first teaching job at Croton-on-Hudson in Westchester County, thirty miles north of New York City. This picturesque and historic village nestled on eight miles of Hudson River shoreline. It was a new and different place, a beautiful location with river gorge views that took her breath away. But still, for Liz, it was life in “the sticks.” She yearned for someplace more exotic and was active in her pursuit of her dream to see the world.

  Finally, she got her wish. The Department of Defense (DOD) hired her as a teacher in Sapporo, Japan’s northernmost island. While there, she thrilled at the exotic musical
instruments of the Far East. In no time, she mastered them as if they had always been a part of her life.

  Another delight in this far-flung land was the Sapporo Snow and Ice Festival. This event began quite simply in 1950 when six statues were fashioned by a couple of high school students. By 1955, the U.S. military had joined in the festivities when members of Sapporo’s defense force built the first megalithic snow statue.

  By the time Liz arrived on the island, the festival had evolved into an international event of carved and sculpted ice masterpieces that were lit up at night with colored lights. Today, hundreds of statues, some as large as a house, are showcased at the event, including ice renditions of the Statue of Liberty, the Great Wall of China and the pyramids of Egypt. The exhibition drew more than two million visitors to Sapporo every February.

  In 1968, Liz was ready to travel on and the Department of Defense was prepared to accommodate her. Fluent in French and German, she was a valuable asset as a teacher of children in military families. They offered her a new teaching position in Germany.

  Between her teaching, her folk singing, traveling and a growing battalion of friends, Liz’s life in Europe was full. She became close friends with another teacher, Patty Peterson. Patty’s family of four lived on her teacher’s salary while Mike worked on building a career as a writer. Liz wrote home to her sister Margaret asking her to send hand-me-down clothing for the two Peterson boys. Margaret was delighted to help Liz’s friends. Liz always remembered her children’s birthdays with a card and a beautiful book. It was the least she could do.

  There was only one thing missing and it came walking into her life in the form of a tall Texan. Liz met George Ratliff, an Air Force navigator, in a stereotypical rendezvous point for a DOD teacher, at the Officer’s Club.

  George Ratliff was All-state in football at Van Vleck High School in Texas. He graduated in 1968 and followed in his father’s footsteps to Texas A&M University as a member of the Corps of Cadets. He majored in Industrial Technology and was a member of the G-2 company of Second Brigade.

  A year later, another second generation Aggie, Randy Durham, joined the same company. He was the first one in the Corps to major in Philosophy. Despite their seemingly incompatible majors, George and Randy hit it off well—even selling encyclopedias together one summer.

  Both cadets were in Army ROTC, but wanted to join the Air Force when they graduated. For Randy, that transition was easy. His dad was career Air Force and that gave him the option of transferring his commitment.

  Transferring was not so easy for George. He had to bust his Army contract when he approached graduation. At times, the Army held tight to those agreements. But now, with the Vietnam War winding down, the Army was downsizing as quickly as it could. They let his contract slide and George enlisted in the Air Force.

  By going this route, it took George longer to get where he wanted to go. He took basic training at technical school and followed that up with another basic training at Officers Training School. Then he was accepted to the Officers Commission program and sent off for navigator’s training, where he reunited with Randy Durham, who had graduated a year after he did.

  In the interim, George had married and divorced the sister of one of his classmates. The marriage lasted two years on paper, but in reality the couple was together only a handful of months.

  George and Randy were both assigned to C-130s at Dyess Air Force Base in Abilene, Texas. After a couple of years there, an opportunity arose and George snatched it up.

  Rhein Main Air Force base near Frankfurt, Germany, had, until now, only temporary assignments or rotations for C-130 squadrons. The decision was made to station a permanent squadron there. George put in for the first cadre and resituated in Germany in 1978.

  There he met Liz McKee, an artistic soul with a personality well suited for her job as an elementary school teacher. She was gentle with the children and the well of her patience was bottomless. George was enchanted.

  By the time Randy came to Rhein Main in 1980, the two were an item. Liz was spending more time at George’s loft apartment than she was at her own. They lived in Klein-Gerau, the same village as Randy and his wife, Carol Durham—they were the only two American couples living there.

  Both men were members of the Blue Tail Flies, a squadron of C-130s with AWADS (Adverse Weather Aerial Delivery System) capability, which enabled their craft to operate in nasty weather. They delivered cargo and personnel and performed other missions all over Europe including down the Berlin Corridor. They were often gone for days at a time.

  Before George and Liz married, they made a trip back to the States to meet each other’s families. Liz’s relatives were enchanted with George. Her nephew, Damon Blair, named all of his stuffed animals and superhero figures “George” after meeting his uncle-to-be.

  Liz was getting close to the dreaded 40th birthday, and although George was seven years younger, time for starting a family was running out. The couple was ready to begin.

  Liz selected her wedding site with care. She chose a spot steeped in history, the Römer city hall, a complex of three patrician buildings with an ornate balcony and a crusty Gothic façade. The medieval surroundings lent the civil ceremony a solemn air of gravity. The gods must have smiled on their nuptials, because the early May day was glorious.

  This was one of the first warm days of the year—unusually beautiful for Germany in the spring. Five Americans were present when the couple made their commitment: George and Liz, maid of honor Patty Peterson, best man Randy Durham and George’s mother, Martha, who traveled to Germany from Cedar Lane, Texas, for the occasion.

  That evening, the newlyweds had a reception to celebrate. All five members of the wedding party were there. Randy’s wife Carol, Patty’s husband Michael, and a few other close friends joined them.

  Liz and George moved from the loft apartment—which was little more than glorified attic space—down to the second floor. This apartment had a balcony with a breathtaking view across the fields to the neighboring village of Gross-Gerau, one mile away.

  Since Liz’s first child was due in December, she took a sabbatical from her teaching job. She opened a private pre-school in her home. Her first student was Randy and Carol’s son, Jonathan.

  Liz had a difficult pregnancy. So-called morning sickness plagued her day and night throughout her childbearing. A great fear lurked in the back of her mind. Like her father and both of her sisters, Liz had von Willebrand’s disease, a blood disorder. It is believed to be the most common genetic disorder in the world—one hundred times more prevalent than hemophilia. It is thought to affect one in every forty people.

  The main symptom is excessive bleeding—like recurrent nose bleeds or bleeding from the gums. The severity of the disease varies from person to person even within a family. People with milder cases experience nothing more than prolonged or easy bruising, a symptom that can be explained away or ignored. Moderate cases display unusual bleeding. In women, this is most noticeable in excessive menstrual flow, which is often misdiagnosed. It is unknown how many women have undergone unnecessary hysterectomies because of medical personnel overlooking the possibility of von Willebrand’s disease.

  Those with an extreme shortage or total lack of von Willebrand’s factor in their blood have the most extreme form of the disease. They can experience spontaneous hemorrhages in major joints such as knees and shoulders. If undiagnosed and untreated, these severe cases pose a serious health risk as well as mental and emotional difficulties. Fortunately, Liz’s fear of the worst case scenario was groundless—her condition was mild, and thus caused no complications during childbirth.

  Like many military wives before her, Liz found herself alone when she went into labor. Her husband, George, was away on a mission. Cheryl Appel, who was living with the couple on a temporary basis, was at Rhein Main Elementary School teaching her class. Liz drove herself to the hospital in Wiesbaden, where the nurse on duty was Randy’s wife, Carol. On December 10, 1981, her first
daughter, Margaret Elisabeth, was born.

  George and Liz celebrated their first anniversary in grand style. They rounded up a group of friends and headed north of Frankfurt to the foothills of the Taunus Mountains and Schlosshotel in Kronberg.

  The Empress Frederick, the oldest child of Queen Victoria of England, built this house from 1889—1894 following the death of her husband. She lived there for seven years after its completion. The castle still housed many of her books in English, including a fifty-year collection of bound Pick’s magazines.

  Magnificent grounds with rhododendron, an Italian rose garden and a romantic grotto surrounded the castle. Each of the fifty-eight antique-filled rooms has its own individual character and style. Some feature paintings executed by the Empress.

  During World War II, the castle was commandeered by U.S. troops for senior officer headquarters. It was a favorite spot for General Dwight Eisenhower.

  George, Liz and their friends celebrated with a champagne party and endless toasts to the blissful couple. Their friends returned to Frankfurt, but George and Liz stayed for the weekend. They slept in a royal bed in a corner suite with a romantic balcony overlooking the elegant, manicured back garden.

  Thirteen months after their first daughter was born, along came Martha Katalin on January 3, 1982, named after George’s mother. This time, George was on assignment in the States. Both Liz and George doted on the girls and made them the center of their lives.

  George’s tour of duty was about to end, but he and Liz wanted to stay in Germany. He extended his service in the 7405th Operations Squadron, a classified missions unit. Theirs was a happy, complete home until 1983.