You think you know someone
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| Roger Guthrie in 1964 |
He loved birds and he crafted some of the most beautiful and unique bird houses and feeders imaginable, all tested in he and his wife, Carol's, back yard on Bonners Ferry's north side, and he could wax eloquent on waxwings, chat about nuthatches, caw about a crow he'd met. It sometimes seemed he even knew each common sparrow.
Roger was also an accomplished humorist and musician, and he would play and regale the KBFI listening audience of all the local dances he and his brothers used to play back when that station still broadcast live.
But none of that gets down to who Roger was, it doesn't show the side of him he let few in on. The side that went deeper than the affable, devoted family man most knew.
You think you know someone, too often finding out you never realized until too late the true mettle of an old friend.
Roger died at the age of 81 on February 20, 2012, and his obituary made small mention; he'd served in the Army during the Korea Korean War, but didn't mention that he served with the 25th Infantry Division, one of the first U.S. units in the fight, blocking the approach to Pusan in the opening days of the war before participating in the breakout and the march to the Yalu River.
He left the Army in 1953, returning home to Boundary County and embarking on a 45-year career, first with the Great Northern, later with Burlington Northern Railroad. He and Carol married in 1956 and soon four children filled their Northside home.
His obituary also mentions a heroic event he was involved in while working as a signalman's helper for the Great Northern in June, 1964, when he was credited with saving the life of a lineman who was swept away in a flood on the Clark Fork River.
His obit recounts a news report of the time, which gave a little detail, but nothing like an article Roger's son, Gary, shared with his mom last week via Facebook.
The two-page article in "The Signalman's Journal" of September, 1964, recounts the incident in detail, as it happened to be witnessed by a journal correspondent.
"Your Brotherhood is now in the process of collecting additional information, evidence, affidavits and photos in an effort to see that Brother Roger L. Guthrie receives national recognition for his heroic efforts," the Journal wrote.
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| The 1964 Bad Rock Canyon Washout. |
"Torrents of water gushing down the mountainside several days earlier had carried away 560 feet of grade, ties and track, leaving only two communications and signal poles suspended over the washout, hanging by the wires they previously supported."
The article recounts how lineman George Brady, 35, Wenatchee, Washington, was working on one of the poles to free the wires when the other pole snapped. Realizing the pole he was on wouldn't bear up under the strain, Brady unfastened his safety harness and had started down when his pole snapped, carrying Brady with it to the ground. Brady landed on his shoulder just over the edge of an embankment and tumbled over 150 feet into "the swift moving Middle Fork of the Flathead River."
Guthrie, then 34 and a signalman's helper, was standing with a signalman tester a little east of the pole Brady was working on when it went down.
"When the pole snapped," the article relates, "Guthrie dashed to the spot, jumped over the embankment, becoming momentarily entangled in the fallen wires, and leaped down the 70-degree slope, rolling, scrambling and clawing his way to the bottom. He plunged into the water and grabbed Brady's inert body, floating face down, just as it was being pulled into the 15 mile-per-hour current."
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| Photo from the article showing the slope George Brady rolled down. |
They administered first aid and kept the delirious and seriously injured Brady warm with their own coats and jackets until a rescue boat from Columbia Falls and an Army helicopter from Kalispell arrived and Brady, carried by boat to a sandbar on which the helicopter could land, was flown to safety.
Guthrie's quick thinking and selfless and appropriate actions were credited with saving Brady's life. He was later honored for his actions at a special ceremony in Spokane.
You think you know a good man, and come to learn you hadn't even scratched the surface.