California couple had marked 50-year anniversary before fire
At least 35 people have died in the deadliest week of wildfires in California history. The victims include a couple who recently celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary, a 14-year-old boy whose parents and older sister were severely burned, and a woman born with a spinal defect who worked to help others despite her own troubles.
A look at some of those who were killed in the blazes:
LeRoy and Donna Halbur, both 80, had just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary, and for years Leroy delivered food for the needy three times a week.
They had no chance to flee a wildfire that destroyed their Santa Rosa home early Monday, said their eldest son, Tim Halbur.
«The winds came up pretty quickly. It was all countryside behind them,» Tim Halbur said. «My mom was found in the car in the garage. My dad was somewhere on the driveway. He probably had gotten her into the car, and he went outside to check on conditions.»
Tim Halbur said his parents were devoted to community, friends and family. An avid world traveler, LeRoy Halbur was an usher at Resurrection Catholic Church in Santa Rosa. He volunteered with the Society of St. Vincent de Paul of Sonoma County, delivering meals right up to the week before the fires.
Donna Halbur wrote children’s books and was a former elementary school teacher.
«What I want you to know is that they were very generous of spirit and they carried that spirit to the community,» their son said.
DOING GOOD BY OTHERS
Roy Howard Bowman, 87, and his wife, Irma Elsie Bowman, 88, lived a life quietly doing good for others.
The Mendocino County couple provided money to help launch a Spanish-speaking ministry at the Assembly of God church in Ukiah, recalled Sylvia McGuire Nickelson, who met the Bowmans at church.
«They both were beautiful, inside and out,» Nickelson told the San Francisco Chronicle . «I just loved them.»
«Anybody who needed a second chance, the Bowmans were their advocate,» said Felice Lechuga-Armadillo, who with her siblings would host the Bowmans for Sunday dinners. «Anyone who needed help, they stepped forward — but quietly.»
The couple were found in the fire-ravaged remnants of their home in the remote Redwood Valley, about 60 miles (95 kilometers) north of Santa Rosa, on Monday.
Roy Bowman was a U. S. Navy veteran and former federal employee. Irma Bowman loved to bake and «would tell us to speak well of other people,» said Lechuga-Armadillo.
Roy Bowman had a stroke earlier this year. Irma Bowman told Lechuga-Armadillo’s mother that if he had another, she wanted to have one as well — «because she didn’t want to be on this Earth without him,» Lechuga-Armadillo said.
Evans, 75, kept horses, goats, dogs, a mule and a steer at her Santa Rosa home. She’d sometimes lead the mule down the street, allowing folks to feed it, said her longtime neighbor, Tracy Long.
«We knew her as the horse lady,» Long told the San Francisco Chronicle.
As flames approached their homes late Sunday, Brian Strehlow, a neighbor across the street, offered to help.
«She said, ‘We got this,'» Strehlow said.
Evans died while trying to save her dogs.
Evans’ neighbors said they believed that her husband, son and a daughter-in-law were able to escape, but that they hadn’t been able to reach them since the fire.
Evans kept a large collection of books on horses. Long, whose home was damaged by fire, said she occasionally sees pages from Evans’ library blowing along the street.
At 14, Kai Shepherd was among the youngest victims of the wildfires.
After flames swept over a mountain, the Shepherds had tried to drive down to escape. Their neighbor Paul Hanssen found their two charred vehicles blocking the road, doors still ajar from when they had apparently abandoned them and fled on foot.
Hanssen found the mother, Sara Shepherd, and her 17-year-old daughter, Kressa, lying on the ground, more than half their bodies burned. Kai Shepherd was further down the mountain and did not survive.
First responders found Kai’s father, Jon Shepherd, separately, on the mountain. He was also badly burned but alive. Kai Shepherd’s parents and sister are being treated at burn centers.
His sister, Kressa Shepherd, a Ukiah High School junior, had to have both legs amputated beneath her knees.
Family friend Irma Muniz remembers Kai Shepherd was timid and giggly after she met him last year while shooting a Christmas card photo of the family posing in the woods of Redwood Valley, a community of about 1,800 roughly 70 miles (113 kilometers) north in Mendocino County
‘SHE WAS MY LIFE’
George Powell woke to a wall of fire already bearing down on his Santa Rosa home and immediately yelled to his 72-year-old wife, Lynne Anderson Powell: «Get out!»
Lynne Powell grabbed her border collie, Jemma, which always slept next to her, a laptop and asked for the best way to get off their mountain before jumping in her car.
George Powell left 15 minutes later after fetching his three dogs. George Powell now realizes when he raced down the mountain he drove past his wife’s car that had gone off the road and into a ravine in the heavy smoke.
After searching for her all night and the next day, a detective called to tell him a body burned beyond recognition was found steps from her car. Inside was a dog also burned to death.
«If I had known, I would have gone down there with her, even if it meant I would have died with her,» George Powell, 74, said. «I don’t know how I’m going to cope. She was my life.» He repeated: «She was my life.»
The couple had been married for 33 years. He was a photojournalist and she was a professional flutist, spending much of her career playing for the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, which operated until 2011.
The two met while she was on vacation in Los Angeles, where George Powell freelanced for newspapers. He said it was «love at first sight» and he moved to New Mexico to be with her. After they retired, they settled in northern California so his wife could take care of her aging parents.
The two shared a love of border collies and entered in agility runs with their dogs. She was an avid quilter. The fire took everything, including her quilts and his life’s photo archive.
Lynne Powell did not want a memorial service or obituary. But George Powell said he may hold a special lunch with friends to celebrate her life.
«I don’t think I ever felt unloved or uncared for any second of my life with her,» he said.
TOGETHER IN LIFE AND DEATH
Charles Rippey, 100, and his wife, Sara, 98, are the oldest victims of the wine country wildfires identified so far.
Their bodies were found by one of their sons who had made his way past security and found the home in Napa where they had lived for 35 years completely gone. Only two blackened metal chairs, a porcelain tea set of white and soft washes of blue and other small remnants remained to testify to the couple’s long life together.
Charles Rippey — who was known by his nickname «Peach» since he was a toddler — appeared to be heading to the room of his wife, who had a stroke in recent years.
Mike Rippey said his father would have never left his mother. The couple met in grade school and recently celebrated their 75th wedding anniversary with their five children.
«Those of us in the family always would, you know, wonder what would happen if one of them died and the other one was still left because we knew that, you know, there’s no way they would ever be happy whoever was the last one and so they went together,» Rippey, 71, said as he stood among the charred ruins of their home.
The couple attended the University of Wisconsin and married in 1942 before Charles Rippey served as a U. S. Army engineer in World War II. He then became an executive with the Firestone tire company.
