My wife Jean is glowing. She has never had such a joyful experience, but no strong,young male on Flight 579 from Denver offers to help an 83-year-old woman download her bag from the overhead compartment. A woman flight attendant finally comes to her rescue, but nothing can spoil the feeling of rapture that she feels after four days in Estes Park as the guest of Jean and Tom Sutherland.
She is the second oldest Murray among the 70 Murrays attending a clan reunion in Estes Park, Colorado, and being treated to room and board at the fanciest hotels. How, she wonders, can her namesake second cousin and her Beirut hostage husband afford to pick up this enormous tab?
A retired professor of agriculture and a renowned expert in his field, dean of the Ag department at the American University in Beirut when he was kidnapped by the Islamic Jihad in 1985 and held captive for nearly six-and-one-half years (2,354 days), he is a highly resourceful son of Scotland. He, his wife Jean and two of his three daughters sued the government of Iran (the Ayatollah Komeini ordered his capture) and won big.Tom got $17 million; Jean, Kit and Joan hauled in $20 million for a total of $37 million (out of a $373 million judgment). Tom and Jean are generous people who live simple lives and give, give, give. After going through all that hell, I never dreamed of ending up a multimillionaire, says Tom.
They are gracious hosts, but Tom is unable to stay overnight at Estes due to medical problems. On August 30, he enters cardiac care and has aortic artery stents and a pacemaker installed and feels better than he has in eight months. The photo of Jean and Tom is taken at their cabin, 9,300-feet high near Estes Park in Colorado.
My wife’s maiden name is Jean Ann Murray. Tom’s wife’s maiden name is Jean Ann Murray. My Jean was born in 1922 and raised in Chicago. Tom’s Jean in Ames, Iowa, circa 1932 where her father was an Iowa State professor of agricultural economics and founder of the famous Iowa Living History Farm near Des Moines. William Gordon Murray died from cancer at 88 in 1991 just two days before his son-in-law was freed and reunited with his bride at Wiesbaden, Germany. My father-in-law, William M. Murray, retired vice president of Kerr-McGee Oil Company, died at 90 in his home in Oklahoma City on March 6, 1985.
Born and raised in Scotland, Thomas McGee Sutherland earned his Phd degree in animal science at Iowa State in 1958, two years after he married Jean Ann Murray who later received her Phd degree in English Literature and taught in Beirut alongside her husband and continued to teach after his kidnapping. Her doctoral thesis was on Seneca and Shakespeare. Together they wrote the gripping tale of his captivity and her tireless work to win his freedom--At Your Own Risk--that reads like a mystery thriller replete with minute details of their experience. Both demonstrate total recall of events, sights, sounds, smells, conversations, torture, pain, perseverance, patience and a deep understanding of the cultural clashes in war torn Beirut.
Above all, this book reveals the love, commitment and hope of a special couple whose faith in the future never wavered and is free of bitterness in spite of Tom’s inhumane treatment from June 9, 1985 to November 18, 1991. Tom credits fellow prisoner Terry Anderson, Associated Press Middle East Bureau Chief in Beirut and a fellow Iowa State graduate, with saving his sanity. Terry taught Tom political science, journalism and history. Tom taught Terry agriculture, statistics and French. Terry published a best-selling book--Den of Lions--about his 2,454 days of captivity (100 days longer than Tom’s) They maintain a strong friendship forged in pain and chains and profound mutual admiration and respect.
Of his captors Tom says, “They had no education. They didn’t have a decent job. They never had any chance in life at all.”
In contrast, Tom says, “I grew up in Scotland. My dad gave me all kinds of things--a bicycle and a soccer ball--and I got recognition playing soccer. He bought me a power scooter my senior year in high school and paid my way through university. I had everything going for me until I got kidnapped. That was a bit of a setback, to be sure. But even that! I come out smelling like a rose for God’s sake and end up a multimillionaire. You know? It’s incredible.”
Basking in the glow of these two brilliant, beautiful and gracious people, my Jean was overcome with joy. Seeing and talking, talking, talking endlessly with cousins by the dozens, getting to know new Murrays and renewing acquaintances with dear family friends was a renaissance experience--energizing, invigorating and precious.
You might say she had a "Rocky Mountain high" viewing Long’s Peak, one of Colorado’s tallest mountains. One can almost hear John Denver singing his famous song that mirrors the feelings one has when visiting the state with the most 14,000-foot peaks in the lower forty-eight. I have never been in Estes Park, but I have spend many summer vacations at the “Murray Mansion,” a three-bedroom, two-bath cabin inside a guest ranch 8,400 feet up on Mt. Princeton in the Collegiate Range. Sitting on the front porch and watching the sun set over Mt. Antero is a breathtaking sight. The Rocky Mountains are truly majestic.
I can no longer sleep at 8,400 feet, and even Estes Park at 7,300 feet is more than I can tolerate. So I was left alone and lonely in my Laguna Woods condo while my wife had the time of her life.
Now, refueled and overflowing with four days of Murray-Sutherland euphoria, Jean is back in her quality of life routine--working out at the fitness center, playing golf twice a week, duplicate bridge twice a week, social bridge twice a week and reading books evenings instead of watching the boob tube--all activities programmed to keep her mentally alert and extend her life span beyond the century mark. She is on a roll and maintains a quiet, controlled, dignified outlook on life.
On the other hand, I fritter away time at my computer, watch too much C-Span, write angry letters that don’t get printed, joust with windmills, cry out in the wilderness and rant in a chorus with my writing class soul mates--a routine designed to raise my blood pressure and my spirits but aggravate my hardened arteries and spiral me off this mortal coil. I can’t sit at the feet of Tom and Jean Sutherland for inspiration, but I do feed off the warmth and friendship emanating from Ft. Collins, Colorado, via the Internet. We are both grateful these two beautiful people entered our lives.
