John Parr, Sandy Widener and their daughter Chase are much loved and will always be remembered by all their friends and family.
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John Parr, 59, a political consultant who worked with governors, mayors as well as grassroots community groups, his wife, journalist Sandra Widener, 53, and daughter Chase 19, were killed December 22, 2007 after their car was hit by a tractor-trailer six miles west of Rawlins, according to the Wyoming Highway Patrol. Seventeen year old daughter, Katy was the only survivor.
Parr, the co-founder of Denver-based Civic Results, served as president of the National Civic League from 1985 to 1995 and was a board member of the Downtown Denver Partnership. Parr also worked to help elect Dick Lamm, Governor of Colorado in 1974 and, in 1983 served as the transition director for Denver Mayor Federico Peña.
Widener wrote for the Denver Post and co-founded Westword Newspaper.
Chase was a sophomore at Wesleyan University who has a gift for singing and acting. Katy is a senior at East High School where she plays soccer.
Governor Bill Ritter, longtime friends of the family, issued this following statement regarding the deaths of John Parr, Sandy Widener and their daughter, Chase. “There is no way to describe the pain of this terrible, terrible tragedy,” Ritter said. “This is such a devastating loss for the entire community on so many levels. John and Sandy made untold contributions – small, large and every size in between – and touched untold lives. They were loved by so many people that you can feel the tears ripple across Colorado today. We will be in mourning for a very long time.”
In journalism, “30” means the end. But after thirty years, it’s not easy to let somebody go.
By Patricia Calhoun
"Weeks later, I find myself driving down the street and, inexplicably, something will remind me of him — something so simple as a tree — and I’ll find myself blurring with tears.
It’s not easy to let somebody go."
In December 1984, Sandra Widener, one of Westword’s co-founders, wrote a stunning piece for the Denver Post, the paper where she was then working, on the death of a friend, lawyer Jonathan Olom. Reading through “The Death of a Friend,” I’m reminded of several things. That Sandy was a hell of a writer, and did a remarkable job of capturing the spirit of a man who died way too early. A job so good that Jonathan lives on through her words. And now she does, too.
It’s not easy to let somebody go.
I met Sandy the very first day of our freshman year at Cornell University, where we were both assigned to the second floor of Dorm 4, a hideous cinderblock building at the bottom of an even more hideous hill. Since the other four floors were filled with boys, our floor bonded fast. Sandy was fresh from Texas, a tiny blonde in even tinier hot pants with a big personality. She could be feisty and fierce — particularly when people didn’t take a tiny Texan in hot pants seriously — but she was also a hell of a lot of fun. She loved to laugh — everything from a piercing shriek to a raucous hoot to a tee-heeing titter when she was particularly tickled. She would laugh so hard that she’d hug herself and cry, her eyes shining like stars.
It was Sandy who got me into journalism — she joined the Cornell Daily Sun, an independent daily in Ithaca, New York, and encouraged me to do the same. By our junior and senior years, we were spending endless nights in a ramshackle building downtown, listening to the old AP machine, drinking wretched coffee and talking — sometimes about politics, but often about nothing so high-minded — with other Sun addicts.
And I got Sandy to Denver: After graduation, fellow Sun alum Rob Simon and I started a newspaper on Long Beach Island, New Jersey, then fled after one smelly, exhausting summer, leaving that paper to another friend and coming to Denver to start a free weekly because when I’d been here to ski, I thought the state seemed so much more interesting than the media made it look. Sandy, who’d spent the summer in Indonesia, signed on to join our harebrained adventure.
John Parr was a major reason that Colorado was so very interesting, but we didn’t know it at the time.
We started Westword with little money and less sense. For the first issue — most of whose copies never made it out of our garage because we hadn’t quite finished setting up a circulation system — we reported on TV weathermen and the energy boom and Star Wars, still packing them in on Colorado Boulevard. Sandy wrote about Pop Rocks — isolated Denver was a big test market before the Internet started blurring boundaries — and a migrant food fund that was running out of money. She was a serious journalist, but she was also an unstoppable force of nature. She’d streak across the office, leaving chaos in her wake. She was like a comet, Rob said.
And then the comet found her orbit. John Parr had made a name for himself as the smart-growth strategist who’d stopped the Olympics from coming to Colorado, then helped Dick Lamm get elected governor of Colorado. By the late ’70s, he was heading Lamm’s Front Range Project, looking at the future of the metropolitan area. Sandy went to interview him.
“I love him,” she said when she returned to the Westword office, tittering and hugging herself, her eyes crinkling into stars. And for almost thirty years, her life would revolve around the world they created together. The tough cookie had crumbled.
“It’s not the end of everything, but whatever happens next does not take the form of these goofy little bodies and personalities we’re stuck with now. I don’t think we’ll come back to Earth; there are too many other interesting places to be. Why would you think that the best thing would be to come back here and be on Earth again? It’s kind of like saying, I’m afraid to go up the block, afraid to leave the neighborhood.”
After a few years, Sandy left Westword to join Rocky Mountain Magazine and, when that folded, the Denver Post, where she covered everything from rough-and-tough mining towns to the death of a friend. When John moved to New York City to head the National Civic League, Sandy worked for Newsday, covering crime stories while she was hugely pregnant (but still tiny). And then, when John moved the National Civic League’s office to Denver, she started writing textbooks so that she could work at home while taking care of their two daughters, Chase and Katy.
The Parr/Widener home in Cheesman Park became a non-stop salon, always full of interesting people. Friends of the girls from grade school and then East High School. Visiting foreign students. National political figures and policy analysts who were working with John as he continued his civic involvement through the University of Denver and the non-profit Civic Results. Sandy, who was a truly awful cook in the early days, had applied the same stubborn determination to cooking that she had to writing, and was now a star both in the kitchen and at the dinner table. “She was sparkly,” remembers one regular. She could toss off a great one-liner even as she was placating a crying neighborhood kid with a homemade cookie. And as Chase and Katy grew up, it was clear that they had inherited the best of both Sandy and John: a profound spunkiness and an unquenchable spirit.
On December 22, Sandy, John and their two daughters were driving through Wyoming to be with Sandy’s family for the holidays. The car skidded on ice, setting in motion a horrific crash that instantly took Sandy, John and nineteen-year-old Chase, and sent seventeen-year-old Katy and the family dog to the hospital. Katy is now with her relatives in Boise.
The family’s friends in Colorado and across the country are left with an immense black hole, a bottomless sadness.
It’s not easy to let somebody go.
In fact, you hang on to every memory you can. Driving down Colfax, I see the Satire where we first ate Mexican food — “This plate is hot!” — and the club where we went country dancing before it was cool. (In Boston, Sandy once pogo’d with I.F. Stone, an equally tiny and feisty journalist.) With each reminiscence — of the insane college capers, of those sleep-deprived and lunatic-laden early days of Westword, of a night just a few weeks ago when we laughed so hard that a friend passing by the restaurant swore he could hear us inside — I keep wanting to reach for the phone to call Sandy, to utter a few words and be rewarded with a shriek. I’ll get several numerals into the call before I suddenly remember that she’s gone. That John’s gone. That Chase is gone, and that Katy will have to cope with what remains.
For all the conversations we had, Sandy and I never really talked about death — just those friends we’d lost. But she did talk about it with Jonathan, who left her his leather jackets — because she was the only person small enough to fit into them.
“The universe is a perfect system, from the smallest plants and animals to the structure of the Earth and the solar system,” he told her. “Everything that happens is part of that perfection. Like Einstein said, ‘God would not play dice with the world.’ Death is enormous, but it’s possible to be comfortable with it.”
"In some bitter, ironic way," Sandy concluded, "his life and death almost seemed designed for the friends he left behind, to remind us that even someone like Jonathan could die, that we should pay attention to life because it is fragile."
It is impossible to imagine this town without Sandy and John and Chase. They represent the very best of Denver, a city where people are inspired to follow their dreams and make things happen — whether it’s stopping the Olympics or starting a paper or electing a governor or electing a mayor. In 1982, John was instrumental in convincing Federico Peña to run for mayor. During one planning session, Sandy and Rob Simon were locked in a room until they came up with Peña’s campaign slogan: Imagine a great city.
Sandy and John created that city. They are this city. And it will not be easy to let them go.
The day after the crash, as the news of the tragedy was streaking across the country, East High School students organized a candlelight vigil for Katy, a remembrance for Chase and her parents. There was a full moon over Cheesman that night, and right by it, a bright star I’d never seen before.
It sparkled.
There will be a service for Sandy, John and Chase in a few weeks in Denver, when Katy Parr is well enough to attend. In the meantime, a memorial site has been set up at http://johnsandychase.muchloved.com.
John and I were great, maybe even best, friends in college. We went to Purdue in that formative anti-war, pro-feminist, empowered time of the late 60's. We were at a place where those sentiments were pretty alien and of course found each other. John ran for student body president, and I agreed to be his campaign manager. What did we know? We were passionate, we were inexperienced, and WE LOST. John extolled the virtues of the Greek system at the dorms and the benefits of dorm living in the fraternities. He was the ultimate in speaking truth to power, and they spoke back. The guy who won has never been heard from since, and we know John has. I am still reeling from the loss of him and his family. I loved how much he loved his life in Denver. I loved that he still had that goofy laugh. I loved that we could stay friends even in years when we never had a chance to talk. I will miss him greatly for a long, long time.
Kathy Bushkin Calvin
A small group of us freelance writers gathered in a Washington Park home in 1977 to join Patty Calhoun, Sandy Widener and Rob Simon in planning the first edition of Westword. We knew Denver had never seen a publication like this before. Not even the Straight Creek Journal or the celebrated Cervi's Journal dared to fulfill a vision this audacious.
In the five years that followed as I wrote for almost every edition of Westword until my journalism career took me in other directions, my editor was Sandy Widener. I grew to respect and honor her keen editorial instincts, from finding the right angle in a story to spotting that missing element in my reporting to gave the whole piece its broader context. I also grew to love her wit and good humor, her charm, and her strong sense of integrity.
I felt deeply moved by the news of Sandy's sudden accidental death with most of her family. The fragility of life was driven home to me along with a firm conviction that none of us can afford to defer our dreams. If we have a clear vision, like Sandy shared with Patty and Rob, we need to get off our backsides and go for it --now!
Sandy, you are missed.
Ken Judah Freed
Author, Global Sense
Host, KGNU "Metro" Talk show
Publisher, Media Visions Press Ltd
http://media-visions.com
I like so many have been shocked and devastated by the horrible news of the unspeakable loss of your dear Sandy, John and Chase. With lives lived so fully, so richly connected to family, neighborhood and community, their sudden departure leaves a gapping hole in the lives of so many. Yet the fullness of connection with which they all lived their lives leaves a tremendous warmth and inspiration in my heart. I know you all are aware of what fabulous human beings Sandy, Chase and John were. But when Eli died at the age of 8 in 2002, it brought me some comfort to hear stories about the people he touched that I didn’t know about until that telling. It is with that intention that I share these words with you.
For many years Sandy and I walked our dogs together around Cheeseman Park, and walked the kids to the bus stop when they attended Montessori. During these walks we pondered together concerns of parenting, domestic and political life, debated issues of the nature of reality large and small, from Kabbalah, challenges relating to life and death, to what to make for dinner for a small party I was planning. Sandy and I walked for the last time the Friday before Christmas, before we each went our own ways, ---her to Idaho and me to Mexico for a family reunion. We talked in anticipation of your Christmas in Boise, and all of your wonderful holiday traditions that you have created over the years. We talked about our dogs, where Henry and Katy are applying to college, the East High School’s Holiday choir concert at where Katy and Rosa sang together a few weeks earlier. Mundane stuff really, but the stuff and substance of life.
Sandy made valentines cards with Eli that February day, in 2002, two weeks before he died. At that time, I couldn’t bear the thought of Eli’s last return to his school and Sandy jumped in to help. She did this as she did so many things—graciously and without much ado. I could hear them laughing and making a mess in the living room—telling goofy stories about each classmate Eli was addressing. When Eli returned to school the last time on Valentines day, he did not mind so much that he was in a wheel chair and unable to hold his head high. He came to offer his classmates these small tokens of his love and Sandy’s hand had touched each offering. Earlier that year she made Christmas cookies for us to offer to people donating to the Children’s Fund in Afghanistan, when Eli had set up a neighborhood booth for that purpose. On a walk I had told her our neighborhood coffee shop was donating coffee and cocoa, and Sandy offered to make cookies with Rosa and Eli to sweeten the deal for those making contributions. They were the most creative and beautiful cookies I had ever seen!
A few years later we were walking in the park discussing what I should make for dinner for my extended family, before Rosa’s Bat Mitzvah party. During our walk Rosa called to tell me Dan had been in a bad bike accident and was heading to the hospital. Sandy without a second thought announced that she would take care of the dinner for 35. With only a few days’ notice, and again without a second thought, she made an entire gourmet dinner for my whole extended family the night of Rosa’s Bat Mitzvah so I could tend to Dan, who was still in the hospital. Sandy did these things not because I was her closest friend. Sandy jumped in whenever and wherever she could to offer herself and her gifts to the world. She offered us the use of her cabin, the use of her home for Rosa when Eli was sick, the benefit of her wisdom and experience on everything from travel plans to recipes.
Sandy created a home and family life that was so full. Chase and Katy had a childhood that seemed so packed with activities, while there was still so much time to hang out and be relaxed. I often urged Sandy to write a novel about the girls’ adventures—from the travails of Chase’s girls scout troop over more than a decade, to the amazing volunteer activities they all were involved in. I often thought it would be uplifting for the whole country and world to see family life in the late 20th and early 21st century could be so wholesome, so adventurous, so alive!!!!
Of course, with all the writing that she did, Sandy never did get to write her own novel, something we talked about from time to time. Yet as I grapple with that pain, I realize that she lived her story, with the fullness of all the highs and lows, joys and sorrows that life has to offer. In so doing, she affected so many, so profoundly with her practical common sense and matter of fact generosity. I am so honored and so grateful to be among those so touched.
From our many discussions walking in the park over the years I know that Sandy did not consider herself to be particularly spiritual or religious person, although she loved traditions of every ilk—
especially the ones your family created over the years of holidays and reunions. Yet, as I often told her, she lived her life with the generosity and fullness of heart that spiritual and religious people strive for in all their yearnings. She did this I believe, because of the love and support she received from her upbringing, the connection she felt to all life that pulsed around her, and her unique spirit that allowed for a split second willingness to dive in whenever energy or creativity was called for.
Sandy, John and Chase were so engaged in life politically, professionally, in the schools and neighborhoods where they lived. But to me it is really the small things that mark their greatness. Those acts of involvement and kindness of which I speak could be spoken of by hundreds of others—Friends, teachers, cousins, classmates, fellow workers of Chase, colleagues and comrades, friends, neighbors, employers and employees and committee members of Sandy’s and John’s. Looking back, the power of this level of connection to the small in life and the fullness with which they all lived is the inspiration that will live on in me and in the hearts of so many.
I offer you my prayers and my love, and most of all my heartfelt gratitude for bringing this beautiful being of Sandy into the world, for participating so fully in the lives of her and John, Chase and Katy and being the loving family that you are.
Katy, please know that you are so loved. You will come home to the embrace of a community that cares so deeply for you, that prays for your healing on every level, that welcomes you back, when ever you can return, will full and open arms.
With love and deepest sympathy,
Lili Zohar, mother of Henry, Rosa and Eli Perlman
On the last Sunday morning in March, I glanced at the Purdue Alumni magazine, and saw the bare notice that John Parr had died. It took only minutes to learn of the tragic event, and the sad losses in his family. I stood on a bluff looking out over a suddenly colder and more empty Lake Michigan, thinking of so much. I was lucky. John, Kathy Buskin Calvin, and other good friends were a year behind me at Purdue. For several years, we participated in a lot together, both serious and fun. Kathy has wonderfully captured the flavor of it. John was very smart, and genuinely engaged the people he interacted with. Woven throughout were his wit and a joy which bubbled through, even in the serious moments. He and I would walk the campus, mostly to talk, and the topics were seldom known at the outset. On the bluff last Sunday morning, I thought of a summer road trip we took in his red Austin Healey (a big one) to Elkhart Lake, just 20 miles from where I was standing, thinking of him, decades later. We saw each other for five or 10 years after graduation, including a visit in Denver. But then, I guess, lives intruded.
What struck me the most in reading the many tributes to him and Sandy was that his great qualities which made him stand out at Purdue became writ large throughout the rest of his life. The people who knew him much later in his life are describing the same talents and capacity for caring and engagement we knew then, which he developed and put to such wonderful and prominent use on a far larger stage. He was so constant and true, while achieving so much.
Even before this, I gained the opinion that current students, in part because of their ingrained technology habits, will do a far better job than most of us did in keeping in real touch as the years go by. I cannot express how deeply I regret at this moment that I had not acted on that lesson I abstractly knew. Michael T. Reagan, April 3, 2008
I work for the dining services at Wesleyan University, and the day I met Chase I remember so vividly. I was working the register and she had just purchased something using her student id card. I took a look at her face and was in awe of how beautiful she was. Her eyes were almost hypnotizing, to me as I couldn't seem to look away from them. So me being the clown that I am I noticed her last name was Parr and said to her, "you're not up to par", as I handed the ID back to her. She smiled of course and so I said it again. I turned to my buddy Miguel who was making drinks and said "Miguel look, she's not up to par. Her last name is Parr, so i said that she's not up to par." I turned back to Chase, who by the way was still smiling. Then she said "you know people say that all the time to me. They say Chase, your not up to par". I asked, that's your name, Chase? She responded with a yes and I was like wow, thats usually a boys name but it's really pretty as a girls name. She grabbed what she purchased and got out of the line. I wanted to talk to her more, but the line was fairly long at the cafe and I did have to see to the other students. But Chase was definitely one of my favorite students. She was short and so am I so I thought she was so adorable. It's funny because one day I was working at the cafe and I had been in a really bad mood that day. My buddy Miquel couldn't even say anything to me without me biting his head off. Well Chase had been standing in line to get a drink and she must have noticed that I wasn't in the greatest mood. So she said something quite funny, and believe it or not I actually started smiling. And said Hi Chase, and she responded with Hi Nicole. (smiling) She was the only one that could make me smile. Because she touched my life in such a short time, I recently got her name tattooed on my chest. I miss you Chase.
John and I were great, maybe even best, friends in college. We went to Purdue in that formative anti-war, pro-feminist, empowered time of the late 60's. We were at a place where those sentiments were pretty alien and of course found each other. John ran for student body president, and I agreed to be his campaign manager. What did we know? We were passionate, we were inexperienced, and WE LOST. John extolled the virtues of the Greek system at the dorms and the benefits of dorm living in the fraternities. He was the ultimate in speaking truth to power, and they spoke back. The guy who won has never been heard from since, and we know John has. I am still reeling from the loss of him and his family. I loved how much he loved his life in Denver. I loved that he still had that goofy laugh. I loved that we could stay friends even in years when we never had a chance to talk. I will miss him greatly for a long, long time.
Kathy Bushkin Calvin
A small group of us freelance writers gathered in a Washington Park home in 1977 to join Patty Calhoun, Sandy Widener and Rob Simon in planning the first edition of Westword. We knew Denver had never seen a publication like this before. Not even the Straight Creek Journal or the celebrated Cervi's Journal dared to fulfill a vision this audacious.
In the five years that followed as I wrote for almost every edition of Westword until my journalism career took me in other directions, my editor was Sandy Widener. I grew to respect and honor her keen editorial instincts, from finding the right angle in a story to spotting that missing element in my reporting to gave the whole piece its broader context. I also grew to love her wit and good humor, her charm, and her strong sense of integrity.
I felt deeply moved by the news of Sandy's sudden accidental death with most of her family. The fragility of life was driven home to me along with a firm conviction that none of us can afford to defer our dreams. If we have a clear vision, like Sandy shared with Patty and Rob, we need to get off our backsides and go for it --now!
Sandy, you are missed.
Ken Judah Freed
Author, Global Sense
Host, KGNU "Metro" Talk show
Publisher, Media Visions Press Ltd
http://media-visions.com
I like so many have been shocked and devastated by the horrible news of the unspeakable loss of your dear Sandy, John and Chase. With lives lived so fully, so richly connected to family, neighborhood and community, their sudden departure leaves a gapping hole in the lives of so many. Yet the fullness of connection with which they all lived their lives leaves a tremendous warmth and inspiration in my heart. I know you all are aware of what fabulous human beings Sandy, Chase and John were. But when Eli died at the age of 8 in 2002, it brought me some comfort to hear stories about the people he touched that I didn’t know about until that telling. It is with that intention that I share these words with you.
For many years Sandy and I walked our dogs together around Cheeseman Park, and walked the kids to the bus stop when they attended Montessori. During these walks we pondered together concerns of parenting, domestic and political life, debated issues of the nature of reality large and small, from Kabbalah, challenges relating to life and death, to what to make for dinner for a small party I was planning. Sandy and I walked for the last time the Friday before Christmas, before we each went our own ways, ---her to Idaho and me to Mexico for a family reunion. We talked in anticipation of your Christmas in Boise, and all of your wonderful holiday traditions that you have created over the years. We talked about our dogs, where Henry and Katy are applying to college, the East High School’s Holiday choir concert at where Katy and Rosa sang together a few weeks earlier. Mundane stuff really, but the stuff and substance of life.
Sandy made valentines cards with Eli that February day, in 2002, two weeks before he died. At that time, I couldn’t bear the thought of Eli’s last return to his school and Sandy jumped in to help. She did this as she did so many things—graciously and without much ado. I could hear them laughing and making a mess in the living room—telling goofy stories about each classmate Eli was addressing. When Eli returned to school the last time on Valentines day, he did not mind so much that he was in a wheel chair and unable to hold his head high. He came to offer his classmates these small tokens of his love and Sandy’s hand had touched each offering. Earlier that year she made Christmas cookies for us to offer to people donating to the Children’s Fund in Afghanistan, when Eli had set up a neighborhood booth for that purpose. On a walk I had told her our neighborhood coffee shop was donating coffee and cocoa, and Sandy offered to make cookies with Rosa and Eli to sweeten the deal for those making contributions. They were the most creative and beautiful cookies I had ever seen!
A few years later we were walking in the park discussing what I should make for dinner for my extended family, before Rosa’s Bat Mitzvah party. During our walk Rosa called to tell me Dan had been in a bad bike accident and was heading to the hospital. Sandy without a second thought announced that she would take care of the dinner for 35. With only a few days’ notice, and again without a second thought, she made an entire gourmet dinner for my whole extended family the night of Rosa’s Bat Mitzvah so I could tend to Dan, who was still in the hospital. Sandy did these things not because I was her closest friend. Sandy jumped in whenever and wherever she could to offer herself and her gifts to the world. She offered us the use of her cabin, the use of her home for Rosa when Eli was sick, the benefit of her wisdom and experience on everything from travel plans to recipes.
Sandy created a home and family life that was so full. Chase and Katy had a childhood that seemed so packed with activities, while there was still so much time to hang out and be relaxed. I often urged Sandy to write a novel about the girls’ adventures—from the travails of Chase’s girls scout troop over more than a decade, to the amazing volunteer activities they all were involved in. I often thought it would be uplifting for the whole country and world to see family life in the late 20th and early 21st century could be so wholesome, so adventurous, so alive!!!!
Of course, with all the writing that she did, Sandy never did get to write her own novel, something we talked about from time to time. Yet as I grapple with that pain, I realize that she lived her story, with the fullness of all the highs and lows, joys and sorrows that life has to offer. In so doing, she affected so many, so profoundly with her practical common sense and matter of fact generosity. I am so honored and so grateful to be among those so touched.
From our many discussions walking in the park over the years I know that Sandy did not consider herself to be particularly spiritual or religious person, although she loved traditions of every ilk—
especially the ones your family created over the years of holidays and reunions. Yet, as I often told her, she lived her life with the generosity and fullness of heart that spiritual and religious people strive for in all their yearnings. She did this I believe, because of the love and support she received from her upbringing, the connection she felt to all life that pulsed around her, and her unique spirit that allowed for a split second willingness to dive in whenever energy or creativity was called for.
Sandy, John and Chase were so engaged in life politically, professionally, in the schools and neighborhoods where they lived. But to me it is really the small things that mark their greatness. Those acts of involvement and kindness of which I speak could be spoken of by hundreds of others—Friends, teachers, cousins, classmates, fellow workers of Chase, colleagues and comrades, friends, neighbors, employers and employees and committee members of Sandy’s and John’s. Looking back, the power of this level of connection to the small in life and the fullness with which they all lived is the inspiration that will live on in me and in the hearts of so many.
I offer you my prayers and my love, and most of all my heartfelt gratitude for bringing this beautiful being of Sandy into the world, for participating so fully in the lives of her and John, Chase and Katy and being the loving family that you are.
Katy, please know that you are so loved. You will come home to the embrace of a community that cares so deeply for you, that prays for your healing on every level, that welcomes you back, when ever you can return, will full and open arms.
With love and deepest sympathy,
Lili Zohar, mother of Henry, Rosa and Eli Perlman
On the last Sunday morning in March, I glanced at the Purdue Alumni magazine, and saw the bare notice that John Parr had died. It took only minutes to learn of the tragic event, and the sad losses in his family. I stood on a bluff looking out over a suddenly colder and more empty Lake Michigan, thinking of so much. I was lucky. John, Kathy Buskin Calvin, and other good friends were a year behind me at Purdue. For several years, we participated in a lot together, both serious and fun. Kathy has wonderfully captured the flavor of it. John was very smart, and genuinely engaged the people he interacted with. Woven throughout were his wit and a joy which bubbled through, even in the serious moments. He and I would walk the campus, mostly to talk, and the topics were seldom known at the outset. On the bluff last Sunday morning, I thought of a summer road trip we took in his red Austin Healey (a big one) to Elkhart Lake, just 20 miles from where I was standing, thinking of him, decades later. We saw each other for five or 10 years after graduation, including a visit in Denver. But then, I guess, lives intruded.
What struck me the most in reading the many tributes to him and Sandy was that his great qualities which made him stand out at Purdue became writ large throughout the rest of his life. The people who knew him much later in his life are describing the same talents and capacity for caring and engagement we knew then, which he developed and put to such wonderful and prominent use on a far larger stage. He was so constant and true, while achieving so much.
Even before this, I gained the opinion that current students, in part because of their ingrained technology habits, will do a far better job than most of us did in keeping in real touch as the years go by. I cannot express how deeply I regret at this moment that I had not acted on that lesson I abstractly knew. Michael T. Reagan, April 3, 2008
I work for the dining services at Wesleyan University, and the day I met Chase I remember so vividly. I was working the register and she had just purchased something using her student id card. I took a look at her face and was in awe of how beautiful she was. Her eyes were almost hypnotizing, to me as I couldn't seem to look away from them. So me being the clown that I am I noticed her last name was Parr and said to her, "you're not up to par", as I handed the ID back to her. She smiled of course and so I said it again. I turned to my buddy Miguel who was making drinks and said "Miguel look, she's not up to par. Her last name is Parr, so i said that she's not up to par." I turned back to Chase, who by the way was still smiling. Then she said "you know people say that all the time to me. They say Chase, your not up to par". I asked, that's your name, Chase? She responded with a yes and I was like wow, thats usually a boys name but it's really pretty as a girls name. She grabbed what she purchased and got out of the line. I wanted to talk to her more, but the line was fairly long at the cafe and I did have to see to the other students. But Chase was definitely one of my favorite students. She was short and so am I so I thought she was so adorable. It's funny because one day I was working at the cafe and I had been in a really bad mood that day. My buddy Miquel couldn't even say anything to me without me biting his head off. Well Chase had been standing in line to get a drink and she must have noticed that I wasn't in the greatest mood. So she said something quite funny, and believe it or not I actually started smiling. And said Hi Chase, and she responded with Hi Nicole. (smiling) She was the only one that could make me smile. Because she touched my life in such a short time, I recently got her name tattooed on my chest. I miss you Chase.
I started to build my Tribute to John Parr, Sandra Widener & Chase Parr today.