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Guest column/50 years have passed since fatal crash, but memories hurt

Fifty years is a long time. Enough time for memories to fade and for faces to disappear. But you still remember. A date stands out in my mind and will not go away, ever. That date is Aug. 21, 1967. Fifty years ago, today.

In the early hours of that morning we were awakened with the news that my dad was involved in a car wreck in lower Follansbee. We soon found out he had been killed. As the day went on, we were told bits and pieces of what happened.

My dad was a passenger in a car with three of his co-workers and one of their wives. Heading south on state Route 2, the driver went left of center entering a curve clipping the rear of a semi truck, and sending them head on into another one. All four men in the car were killed. The lone survivor was the driver’s wife, who was critically injured.

The accident was splashed across the front page of the local newspapers including a photo of the death car. All four men worked for Koppers Corp. and were good friends. All left behind wives and families whose lives would never be the same. Four women became widows and 20 children became fatherless in the blink of an eye. The woman who survived had 10 children.

My dad had just been promoted to foreman in the mill, and had bought his first new car. He had started a two-week vacation that was to take us to California to visit a brother in the Air Force. A much-deserved vacation. Yes, things were starting to look up for us. Instead, we attended a funeral for a man of just 39 years.

As a 9-year-old, you don’t think much of the future. You live for the day. I was two months shy of my 10th birthday and getting ready to enter the fourth grade. I still remember our last words — dad told me to tell my mom that he was going across the river to visit some friends. I asked if I could go along. He told me no, you better not. Words that haunt me to this day. If he’d only said yes.

Soon after the accident, blame was assigned and lawsuits were filed. I remember my mother going to court. I remember the verdict not going in our favor. It didn’t matter, as nothing would change the outcome of that day.

The state school board asked permission to use the accident scene as an educational tool for drivers-ed classes. I remember the flare up that this caused. Permission was denied.

My mom never remarried. She was a homemaker with four kids to raise. She had to learn how to drive a car, balance a checkbook and pay the bills.

She had to learn how to budget for tomorrow as we lived month to month on my dad’s Social Security. She never complained. Her faith in God and her love for her children got her through, got us all through. My mother passed away in 2014 on Flag Day, my dad’s birthday. She never took off her wedding ring.

Years went by and, to my knowledge, there was never any contact with the other families. Back then, we never gave it any thought. We just got on with our lives. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve often wondered what happened to those other families. How did they cope after the accident? Did they struggle for answers like we did? Did they all make it through? Is that date etched in their minds, as it is ours? I doubt I’ll ever know.

Each year as the anniversary of the accident approaches I am drug back to a date in time I wish had never happened. A date in time I wish I could forget. But it did and I can’t and here it is again. Aug. 21. Yes, 50 years is a long time.

(Renforth, a resident of Avondale, Ariz., is a former resident of Georges Run.)

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