Letters to Jackie (40 page)

Sheldon, Judy

Judy Sheldon’s sister Anita recalls that “Judy had a heart of gold, and she was at her best when someone she loved needed comfort. After 1963 she continued to work as an office manager for an important accounting firm and she also continued to study voice, which she had done as a hobby for many years. Opera was her love and she performed several times, in the fifties and early sixties, with other students, first at the Music School of the Henry Street Settlement and then at the Mannes School of Music, both in New York. As the years went by she gave up her music
studies, but she continued to sing at family occasions and friends’ parties. She and I were planning to retire when she reached sixty-five, and she was looking forward to spending the rest of her life in our little house in East Hampton. Unfortunately she never made it: cancer took her in 1999. I am sure she is in a better place now, but I will never stop missing her.”

Shelmire, Dr. and Mrs. David

Dr. Shelmire was born in Texas and attended Highland Park High School and the University of Texas. He came from a family of doctors and earned his medical degree in 1960 at Washington University Medical School. He completed his internship at Baylor and his residency at the University of Michigan Hospital. Dr. Shelmire is now seventy-five years old and still practicing dermatology full time.

Sherman, Estelle

Born into a Polish immigrant and coal-mining family in Forestville, Pennsylvania, Estelle Sherman lived most of her life with her husband, George, in Spring Lake Heights, New Jersey. She raised two daughters and a son, and was a devoted and much-beloved figure in her family and community. Her daughter recalls that her mother “visited the elderly in nursing homes, hand-decorated Polish Easter eggs for family and neighbors, and always made candied apples for the neighborhood children at Halloween. Some of those children returned years later with their own children to Trick or Treat for Mrs. Sherman’s candied apples.” Mrs. Sherman was also renowned for her letter writing. Her daughter writes that her mother “never forgot someone’s birthday or an accomplishment in someone’s life. Her family was fond of saying that she helped keep the post office in business.” Mrs. Sherman died in October 2002.

Siegel, Natalie

Natalie Siegel lives in Florida. She enjoys playing bingo and spending time with friends.

Silverstein, Irving

Irving Silverstein was born in Brooklyn in 1913 and was the son of Russian Jews. He served in the army during World War II and was wounded in the Battle of the Bulge. He and his wife settled on Long Island, where they raised their two daughters. In addition to a sales career in the photographic industry, Mr. Silverstein loved to read, had a passion for golf, and was a lifelong Democrat active in politics. He died on November 25, 1985.

Simrin, Arlene

Mrs. Simrin is now elderly. Her daughter Stacey lives in New Jersey.

Skeats, Claudine R.

Claudine Rogers Skeats was born in November 1918. She married 1st Lieutenant Arthur E. Skeats Jr., a B-29 pilot who was killed in a plane crash on July 24, 1945. Their
son, Arthur, was born after his father’s death. As Secretary to the Base Commander at Brooks Air Force Base, Mrs. Skeats came to know all seven Mercury astronauts who came through the School of Aerospace Medicine at Brooks. She also knew LBJ. Claudine Skeats died in Texas on December 6, 2001, at the age of eighty-three.

Smith, Ernan H.

Ernan Smith continued to work at the power plant for the Latter Day Saints Hospital. He died in his seventies.

Smith, Mrs. Paul

Pat Smith lives in Pennsylvania. Since November 1963, she has had two more children, but also lost two children as well as a grandchild, and in 1998 her husband. She works part-time and during the week takes care of her eight-year-old grandchild. She reports that despite the losses she has experienced, she has had many positive times and is very proud of her two sons, one of whom served in Vietnam and the other in the Air Force. She comments that the Kennedy family gave her a sense of strength during difficult times.

Smith, Tommy

Tommy Smith and his brother played hooky on November 22, 1963, to go downtown to Dallas to see President Kennedy. He has kept a box of memorabilia that he collected at the time of the assassination—an event he still remembers vividly. He writes: “Through my teens, I was very interested in current events. School often took a backseat as I intensely followed the news, like standing along the Kennedy motorcade route or attending a session of the Jack Ruby murder trial. The dramatic, chaotic news events of the 1960s nurtured my dreams of a career in journalism. However, my first year in college included a class in geology, and I realized that my real dream was what it had always been as a boy, and that was to become a scientist. My love for current events and my passion for earth science are with me now, as I continue in a career involving environmental consulting and teaching at the college level. My commitment to keeping abreast of the latest scientific developments and passing those on to eager students is rooted in those tumultuous days of my teens, when calm and chaos became routine, when the cheers of the crowd and three rifle shots became one sound, and a boy watched as the world revealed itself in glory and shame.”

Snell, Alma

Alma Snell was born in 1923. She farmed on the Fort Belknap Reservation with her husband, authored two books on the Crow way of life, and was an adviser on the creation of the National Museum of the American Indian. She died in 2008.

Snider, Mrs. Merlene

Merlene Snider was one of the first young women in her area of West Virginia to graduate from high school. She loved writing and music, and often penned short
stories and songs. She suffered from Huntington’s disease and eventually succumbed to it.

Sooby, Donna

Donna Sooby’s family reports that she “enjoyed life and lived it to its fullest. She loved the outdoors: camping, boating, hiking, snowmobiling. She went on to earn a Ph.D. and to conduct research on leukemia. Ironically, she died from the disease in 1975 at the age of forty-three.”

South, Mary

Mary South Certa grew up in Santa Clara, California, earned a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s in education, and became a teacher. Her love of language and history, which began in the 1960s, continues today. Married for thirty-eight years and a mother of three, she lives in Campbell, California.

Spector, Pauline and Sol K.

Mrs. Spector’s family writes: “Whenever a friend or family member had a loss, Pauline would write a letter expressing her condolences. She and Sol felt that the Kennedys were part of our family, and she felt moved to send the note to Mrs. Kennedy. Both Sol and Pauline have died but lived to take pleasure in their children and grandchildren.”

Stafford, Mrs. Ruth

Mrs. Stafford’s family notes that it “just broke her heart” when President Kennedy was assassinated. She is remembered with “great love” as a woman who “enjoyed life, especially her five grandchildren.” She died on September 23, 1984, at the age of seventy-eight.

Stamos, Katherine and Spiro P.

Katherine and Spiro Stamos have been married for fifty-four years and currently reside in San Francisco. Spiro Stamos was a Hollywood studio violinist for over thirty years. In November 1963, the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra was on a concert tour of Europe, sponsored by the U.S. State Department under the auspices of the Kennedy administration’s fostering the arts and culture program. The “Jackie” referred to in the letter was Marilyn Horne, world-famous mezzo-soprano, and “Henry” was Henry Lewis, the African American conductor to whom she was married at that time.

Stanley-Brown, Katharine

Katharine Stanley-Brown was born in April 1892 and became an artist, musician, and writer, who, along with her husband, Rudolph Stanley-Brown, and two children lived in Washington from 1934 to 1966. Her husband, an architect, was
recruited from Cleveland by Franklin Delano Roosevelt to design public buildings throughout the country with “federal character,” using indigenous materials. After his death in 1944, Katharine Stanley-Brown moved to New York and worked at Harper & Bros., who had published the books she and her husband had written and illustrated in the 1930s. She died in April 1972.

Starr, Morris

Morris Starr still vividly recalls the day of the Kennedy assassination. He is eighty-one years old, a businessman, and is still working.

Steinhart, John

John Shannon Steinhart was born in 1929 and earned a B.A. in economics from Harvard, where he was a varsity swimmer. He served in the U.S. Navy for four years and then studied geophysics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he earned his Ph.D. in 1960. He was a scientist at the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Terrestrial Magnetism in Washington, D.C., and served on the staff of the White House science adviser in the Johnson and Nixon administrations. He had a distinguished career at the University of Wisconsin from 1969 to his retirement in 1991. He died in 2003.

Stone, Helen

Helen Stone was of Dutch ancestry and married a Cherokee Indian. She worked in a laundry in Columbia, Missouri, and later as a cook at the University of Missouri. She was a wonderful storyteller and extremely dedicated to her seven children. Helen Stone died in 1990 and is greatly missed by those who knew and loved her. Mrs. Stone’s daughter writes, “I often wished I could have her beautiful heart. She loved her family with all her heart, her country, and she loved John F. Kennedy, as we all did. She was a person who loved and had a lot of love to give.”

Storll, Mrs. F.

Sarah S. Storll was born in 1894. She enjoyed reading, bingo, and card playing, often hosting card games at her home for her many close friends. She had one daughter, two grandchildren, and one great-grandchild. Her granddaughter remembers that Mrs. Storll “made history come alive to me from her recollections of the great events that occurred during her lifetime, such as the Depression, the
Titanic
, the
Lusitania
, Triangle Fire, and both world wars.” She died in 1984.

Swain, Marzell

In 1924, at the age of two, Marzell Swain moved to Newark, New Jersey, with her parents. She graduated from South Side High School in 1940. A wife and mother, she enjoyed singing, reading, and the cinema. Her family notes that “Marzell was often called upon by family and friends to read or compose correspondence for them. The richness of her sentiment more than compensated for her lack of money,
especially when sending words of comfort or encouragement.” Her family has “the letters and notes she sent to us over the years,” adding “they were what kept her alive.” Mrs. Swain died in September 2003.

Taylor, Nancy

Nancy Taylor lives in San Jose, California. “I have two beautiful daughters—Jennifer Lynn, thirty-one, and Diane Marie, twenty,” she writes. “The saddest day, November 22, will always live in my heart, the death of hope.”

Thornhill, Mrs. J. M.

Freda Mae Thornhill was born in 1912. She was a housewife and loved to paint. She spent several months in a painting school and left behind a collection of artwork that her son and her granddaughter continue to enjoy. She was very politically active and remained involved in politics after the death of President Kennedy. She died in Dallas in 1980.

Tierney, Bridget

Bridget Tierney is an Episcopal priest, serving a congregation in New Lenox, Illinois. She reports that she is “still an ardent Democrat.” She worked on Barack Obama’s campaign and was in Grant Park on election night—“one of the thrills of my life.”

Tippit, Mrs. J. D.

Marie and J. D. Tippit were married for eighteen years and had three children when Officer Tippit was killed on November 22. Mrs. Tippit remarried in 1967.

Tomaro, Dominic A. and family

Mrs. Tomaro reports that she is “now eighty-five-plus years, recently widowed after a sixty-year marriage to Dominic A. Tomaro, another grave loss. I was really on a sixty-year honeymoon! I am a registered nurse—graduated in 1945. Still applying (however not working) for Ohio nurses license to ‘keep in touch.’”

Tomashek, Mrs. William

“My mother was a nurse for many years,” Mrs. Tomashek’s son William writes. “She enjoyed bowling and loved animals. I know that my father and mother both had very high hopes for where the Kennedys could take this nation. I wish that we all had back many of the things that we had in the ’60s.”

Toomey, Larry

Larry Toomey served with the U.S. Army Signal Corps. He is a civilian employed by the U.S. government. Mr. Toomey enjoys researching the Civil War.

Touchet, John L.

John Touchet was a mechanical engineer. He had four children and earned a pilot’s license later in life. He is now eighty-six years old but remembers clearly the night of the Kennedy assassination, when he stood in for a friend tending bar.

Tyler, Diana

Diana Tyler writes: “I am not sixty years old and recently retired after thirty years at USPS.”

Van Dyke, Ed

Edward Van Dyke was born in September 1916 in Orange, Essex County, New Jersey. He is a graduate of Choate School, where he was a classmate of John F. Kennedy. He was a businessman and died in September 1986 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Vrabel, Mr. and Mrs. Andrew