If you are not a first-time visitor to this Saturday spot, you have likely heard this before: What I’ve enjoyed most in this business is the people I’ve met and the stories I’ve been privileged to tell. There are a handful that really stand out. This one may top them all.
It had its genesis last year in the story of Wells County’s Mike Stohler and his promotion to the rank of general. We had speculated on how many other generals have come out of Wells County (there was at least one — still working that) and how many other fighter pilots. There had been two other Norwell grads, but no other names popped up in our discussions.
Turns out, that’s because I wasn’t raised here, and Mike is too young to have been aware of the other story.
I do not recall when and how Jim Harris’ name came to my attention shortly after those articles ran. Did a reader alert me? Something motivated me to do an internet search which pulled up his listing on www.virtualwall.org, the website tied to the Vietnam War National Memorial.
“This story needs to be re-told,” I thought, “and Memorial Day would be the appropriate time.” So I put it aside but did not forget it.
Sometime in mid-April, I found and made copies of the articles that had appeared in the News-Banner during the first two weeks of February 1971. Curiously, at that time there were no bylines — no names indicating who had written the articles. Jim Barbieri’s style, however, was unmistakable.
A cursory local search found none of Lt. Jim Harris’ surviving siblings in the county, but thanks to Jason and Sam Habegger, I was soon having lengthy chats with his brother Don and the two sisters, one of whom also connected me to Jim’s double-first-cousin and best friend, Dick Harris.
The first indication that this might be more than just a story of one family’s loss came early. How many pairs of brothers marry a pair of sisters? Perhaps more than we might think, but how many are married in a double ceremony and then move into one house? How many of those have five children each, four pairs of those double-cousins being born close together? How many of such families work side-by-side farming, go to the same church and send the majority of those children on to college?
The word “unique” fits.
While it was fascinating hearing their stories of this “special way to grow up,” as Don Harris put it, learning about their careers and where their lives took them from their humble Wells County roots was as well.
“But don’t make this story about me,” I heard from more than one of them. “This needs to be about Jim.” So I did. There are, however, portions from my notebook that need to be shared to round out today’s story on Page 1 about the sacrifice of Wells County’s Lt. James Craig Harris on Feb. 1, 1971.
• Even though it has now been more than 52 years, the memories are still raw. Each and every one of the four had a difficult time sharing where they were when they first heard the news, as well as the ensuing two weeks. “It’s still painful,” Don told me over the phone from his home in Virginia.
I was able to meet Cindy Harris Morphett in person in Fort Wayne. We met at the Vietnam memorial replica on O’Day Road. The emotional part for her was not so much viewing Jim’s name on the Wall, but in trying to share what Memorial Day means to her.
• A very small part of this story is that Jim and Dick Harris played on the 1964 Liberty Center basketball team that lost to Swayzee in the record-setting nine-overtime regional semi-final. After seeing that in the newspaper stories, I got Joe Smekens’ book out which contains an account of that game. Dick Harris was the team’s leading scorer (and indeed would go on to set a number of records at Manchester College which still stand) but had fouled out of the game with 48 seconds left in the fourth quarter with the good guys leading, 52-49. There has always been a general consensus that had he not fouled out, the Lions would have won that game in regulation.
“But then, it would have been just another game and no one would remember us,” Dick told me from his home in San Diego. He chuckled. It is funny how some things work out.
As related in our story, Dick and Jim had intended to enlist together in the Air Force to be fighter pilots, but Dick’s height disqualified him. Turns out he eventually got his wings, however, and enjoyed a career as a commercial pilot for National Airlines and America West, flying Boeing 737s and 757s.
• Jim’s younger sister Cindy, the oldest of the three girls, graduated from Manchester with a degree in dietetics. She would get her masters degree at the University of Kentucky. Her career took her to the Kansas City area, where her two sons did most of their growing up, but an opportunity popped up in the Parkview Hospital system in 1990, about the time her parents were at the age that she should be nearby. She retired in 2012 as the corporate dietician officer, overseeing the dietetics in all of Parkview’s now many hospitals and clinics.
• Patty is retired and living in Howell, Mich. She taught math for several years before quitting to raise their two children, but returned to do some substitute teaching for several years.
When Patty related that she was a student at Ball State in February 1971, I shared that I had been as well. She was in Painter Hall, I was in Williams Hall. Her sister and brother had stories about how their supervisors and peers were so supportive; Patty had one as well with a bit of a twist.
“My dorm director told me she would contact all of my professors to explain the situation,” she recalled. “When I got back two weeks later, I walked into one class; he obviously did not get the message. ‘Where have you been? How do you expect to pass this class if you never show up?’ When I told him what had happened, he got very quiet.”
• After the funeral, Don Harris was able to stay a couple more weeks on his 30-day leave. When it was time to fly back to South Korea, “it was tough to leave, but tougher on Mom and Dad,” he shared. “Here I was, his only son now, going off to his Army assignment.”
Don would get his masters degree in hospital administration while still serving his Army commitment. After his discharge he got another degree from Yale University and spent his career at Fairfax Hospital and the Inova Health System. Now retired, he still does some government relations work for Inova.
• Jim Barbieri wrote two editorials about Jim Harris in the immediate aftermath. His coverage somehow found its way to the desk of President Richard Nixon. The White House sent a nice letter to the Harris family and a brief note to the News-Banner. I feel compelled to share Jim’s opening paragraph of his story about the funeral:
First in war, first in peace, first in the hearts of his grieving Wells County community, First Lt. James C. Harris, a 24-year-old Liberty Twp. airman, who lived and died so there might be “a new birth of freedom,” was laid to rest on Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, as the muffled tone of taps cut the snow-swept air at Fairview Cemetery Friday afternoon.
Cindy’s scrapbooks have more newspaper clippings over the years of letters to the editor from friends and memorials the family placed. The clippings include another editorial Jim wrote upon the death of their father, Claude Harris.
“Jim did such a wonderful job,” Patty Harris Thornburgh told me during one of our chats. “He made my parents so proud.”
• While I cannot overstate how Don, Cindy and Patty remember the closeness of their family and in particular, their brother, all three told me that he had no closer friend than his double-first-cousin Dick. At the supper table the day I had interviewed Dick, I told my wife that I was emotionally drained, but knew it had been much harder on Dick. He has an interesting story of his own, but was the most adamant about not focusing on his career and health issues. He only wanted to talk about Jim. He wanted the story to be about his friend.
“As time goes on people have forgotten Jim and the war,” he told me. “Our family will never forget.”
“You know,” he said at one point, and this sticks in my mind: “It’s been 52 years now and we’ve all aged. We’ve changed, but he’s still the same. Jim will be forever young.”
miller@news-banner.com
