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About Herald and news. (Klamath Falls, Or.) 1942-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 16, 1961)
Mevj England Tom Stunned By Loss Of Skating Heroes In Airliner fi Editor's Note: Across the At lantic from snow - covered New England the naming crash of a jetliner Wednesday wiped o u t the U.S. figure skating team bound for the world champion ships at Prague including al Church reached 4:05 o'clock Wednesday morning, most of the 19.776 population of the town of Winchester were asleep. The town has 4.684 homes mostly sub stantial, two - story, one family dwellings with yards and shrubs the "First Family of Figurejand with snow drifted high at the Skating." the pride of Winches- white picket ' fences. The town ter, Mass. To get the story of center is 10 miles northwest ofl the first day's stunning shock Boston. there, United Press International sent in a special reporting team, headed by H. D. Quigg and in cluding Anthony Potter and Ron- But when the sun fired church spires shortly after 6 a.m., the tragedy began reaching the wak- ing town by radio and TV. The aid S. Supinski. Here is their ac-!last bell at Winchester Senior count. i School is at 8: 10 a.m. An nonor- student senior at that school' was By UPI Special Reporting Team WINCHESTER, Mass. (UPD There is an ancient house, high on a snowy hill, where four wom en lived together alone alone, except for a dream. Their dream was the dance on ice that is figure skating. Now there is one woman. She is nearing 81. For; her the dream is ended. It ended with the searing news from Brussels that her talented daughter and two talented grand daughters had died in the crash of a plane. This town has had three heroes. It is the home of Joe Bellino, the great Navy halfback, and of Mas sachusetts Gov. John A. Volpe. And until 4:05 a.m. Wednesday, when the crash happened, it was the home of a composite hero the Owen family of champion skaters. Out at first light of dawn today to its 5,000 subscribers went the weekly Winchester Star by mail. Its lean, bespectacled editor, James H. Penaligan, had started the presses rolling Wednesday night after pecking out a story on the most painful deadline of his career. It started out: "All Winchester was deeply shocked and heart-sick Wednes day morning when radio news flashed to this country of the tragic deaths in a plane crash at Brussels, Belgium, of Laurence and Maribel Owen, international ly known figure skaters, and their mother, Mrs. Maribel Vinson Owen. The Owen home is at 195 High Street, where the 80-year-old Mrs. Gertrude Vinson re mained with such high hopes. . ." When the gold hands of the black-faced clock in the gray steeple of the First Congregation- FLB Meet Is Slated General agricultural conditions in the Northwest will be. dis cussed Feb. 25 at the annual stockholders' meeting of the Fed eral Land Bank Association of Klamath Falls. The meeting and luncheon will be held at 12 noon in the Pine Grove Room of the Willard Hotel. Vancil Withers of Paisley will re port on the annual directors' meeting which was held in Spo kane in November. Other reports and the election of directors will round out the business portion of the program. Greer Drew and Elbert Stiles will show slides of their recent trophy hunt in Northern Canada. Bryant Williams, manager of the local association, will preside at the meeting. Miss Laurence (pronounced lo rahns because of her French an cestors) Roche Owen, U.S. and North American ladies figure skating champion, Olympic top bet hope and only 16. What the students noticed when they arrived at school was the un usual quiet. The hallways were still. There were red eyes and puffy faces. A couple of teachers j were crying. Laurie Owen had got up and skated every day from 5:30 a.m. until schooltime. Most! everybody by now, at school knew she would not be back. When classes began, Principal W. Howard Niblock got on the public address system: "I am sure that all of you by this 'time are aware of the air crash ... the skating world lost some outstand ing skaters, but we lost a fine friend. "If there was a happy note for; Laurence in this tragedy, it was that her death came at her mo ment of greatest triumph her victory in the North American championships (two days ago). Words are hollow things at a time like this. May we all bow our heads in a moment of silence, and our prayers will speak of our sor row. Amen." Down the lockec-lincd third-floor hall to Room 304 trooped the jun ior English class. Ruth White, prim and precise, sat at the teacher's desk under the Ameri can flag before the yellow wood en desks. Last year, Laurie Owen had proved one of the most prom-i ising pupils Miss White had everj had. She had written two poems which the teacher intended enter ing for a national anthology. Miss White fished in a folder and brought out a piece of light green ruled paper inked with deli cate handwriting. She told the class she would read a poem that Laurie wrote, that showed what kind of girl she was more than anything that could be said about her. She started to read, but the words wouldn't come. She couldn't even say the title.. If she had read it, this is the way it would have gone: The Awakening Softly. Softly the spring comes creep ing! o'er the tired land All men awake refreshed; They rise to greet the world with joy And birds sing, and all becomes new-born. Gloom is but a shadow of the night, long past; Hope is the light. The radiance. The home where "Grammy Vinson lives and where her champion daughter and grand daughters lived was built in 1812. There are plank floors inside. and the place is filled with the trophies of skaters. Mrs. Maribel Vinson Owen, 49 "Mummy" to the two girls was born in Win chester. She won the U.S. figure skating championship nine times and was a member of three Olympic teams. She married Guy Owen, a former Canadian cham pion, in 1938 in Winchester. He died in 1952. Her older daughter, Maribel (Little Maribel and Big Maribel, they were called), '20, and her skating partner, Dudley Richards, 28, of Boston, who also was killed in the crash, had won the Na tional Senior Pairs title in Janu ary. Little Maribel dreamed of teaching after finishing Boston University this June. "Gee, the kids were fine kids,' said editor Penaligan, in his of fice at the rear of a stationery store. "Nobody ever had a word to say against them. They were good with their books. Their grandfather, old Tom Vinson, was a state representative from the Beacon Hill district. "They were a skating family. Old Tom used to put the skates on." Mrs. Vinson, who will be 81 in July, still puts the skates on. She was reported today to be doing remamably well, under sedation. Her rector, the Rev. Dr. John W. Ellison of the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany, said: '.'She's this sturdy New England stock that takes whatever it had to take in stride and that's that. She's a woman who has always had good health. She's never even learned to chew a pill." "Grammy" Vinson was ready for breakfast when her cousin, Miss Catherine Yerxa, arrived. Miss Yerxa had heard the news. She said nothing about it, but sat with Mrs. Vinson at the breakfast table. But the phone kept ringing and also the doorbell and Miss Yerxa was afraid Mrs. Vin son would be told the wrong way. so she told her the plane had made a bad landing. By that time, the rector and the doctor had arrived outside and were deciding how they were go ing to break the news. "The doctor went in, in three or four minutes," the rector said, "and he gave her a shot of seda tive and she didn't even ask a question. Then he sat down and told her there'd been a crash, and she said: 'Are they all dead? Tell me the truth; don't keep any thing from me." " The doctor nodded an affirma tive to her question. The grandmother went upstairs to her bedroom. By this time, the first editions of the Boston papers were arriv ing with the news, and townspeo ple gathered to read them and to talk on sidewalks. Said the Globe "The flashing silver skates of the Owen family of Winchester have been stilled in death." The Traveler began its story: "The graceful Winchester girl with the pixie smile . . ." Thei American began: "All, a 1 1 gone ..." j Ed Quill, manager of the news company, said he sold "a c6uple hundred more Boston papers to day." In his windows a copy of the current edition of the maga-j zine Sports Illustrated w a s! plopped in a conspicuous spot. Onj the cover is a color photo of Laurie, smile flashing, pixie hair cut tumbling. "A lot of them are buying the magazine just fori memory." The day was fading, the sun beating from the horizon against the steeples and the City Hall's I red tower, and the big neon sign mirers who thrilled to their fine of the "Converse Super Market"! personalities and skating skill . . .1 began beaming over the town cen ter. Editor . Penaligan, with no lale space available in his paper lor an editorial, ,ponde 1 what to were dazed by their tragic deaths, finding it hard to believe those fine young girls, poised, graceful, skilled and friendly, are out of: do and then added a couple of competition forever, their young, ing championship, a tragic, yet 5n paragraphs to his news story: lives cut off with so much prom- a sense, fitting ending to a great "Their many friends and ad- ise ahead. Isports career." HERALD AND NEWS, Klumnlh Falls, Ore. "And their mother, formel champion, her daughters' friend, coach, greatest booster and se verest skating critic: skating was her life, and she died accompany ing her daughters to a world skot- Thursday, February 16, 1961 PAGE 5 A SAVE ORPHAN A . ..MJk-A. Plastic Nursing Bottle Saves MORE Lambs! Use this one quart Limb bottle fin- "natural" heads up feeding. Won't break or leak ever, with, stands boiling and freezing. Special lamb nipple sent with every nursing bottle. Ideal for feeding Albeis Suckle the nurs ing feed for all young animals. Complete feeding directions en closed. Ask your feed dealer. ALSERS FEED & FARM SUPPLY 2710 S. 6th TU 4-8300 Woman's Trial Set March 6 HILLSBORO (AP)-Mrs. Audrey Henry of Portland, executive sec retary of Serve Our State, Inc., will go to trial in circuit court here March 6 on a political ma terial charge. 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