The first two weeks

It was on or near my birthday on July 24, 1974, when I came home both excited and scared. Had to tell “First Wife Iris” I had mortgaged everything we owned except for her overshoes to buy a newspaper with the lowest circulation in the state of Montana. Told her it wasn’t making any money since the long-time editor died and his son was not interested in keeping it going.

“That’s why I got it at a very reasonable price,” I said.

Not going into details of the tough economic struggle we had getting the Kalispell Weekly News into the black, and not going to explain how in six years we were the largest of Montana’s 72 weeklies. Just want to recall those first traumatic weeks of taking over a newspaper when I didn’t know sickum about the printing business, not even how type got put on the pages.

Had hired help for printing mechanics, so my biggest concern was what to write about in our first edition of Aug. 1 and what pictures to get. It was fortuitous my friend and famed mountain climber, Dr. Gordon Edwards, got chewed by a grizzly in Glacier Park just in time for me to get his phone interview from the Cardston, Alberta, hospital and go to press with my very first paper featuring a dandy scoop.

Week two is the topic of this column. On Sunday, Aug. 5, 1974, I was covering the seventh annual Flathead Osprey Parachute Meet at the Kalispell City Airport, taking pictures, interviewing parachutists and taking in the action. About half an hour after my interview with 20-year-old Kerry Zacharias, of Calgary, Canada, I wandered south of the hangers to get a broad shot of the action area. That made me the closest person to the spot where Zacharias died.

Maybe 200 people were watching jumpers in the sky, visiting, packing chutes or just wandering, but those of us with eyes to the southeast at the right moment knew we were seeing tragedy ... he just kept falling.

About 250 feet above ground, the pilot chute popped out and a hundredth of a second later, a bit of parachute fluttered out of the sleeve, but at terminal velocity it was too late. Zacharias died instantly. I yelled at Doug Stockhill to call the sheriff’s office then began running to the spot with a few others.

One of them said, “If you take a picture of that kid, I’ll kill you.” I replied, “Cool it, fella. I’m an old jumper and not going to do anything with this camera that will upset anyone.” There was a lot of emotion among those young skydivers. They had decided to live more dangerously but hadn’t yet seen what happens when there’s a mistake.

Within minutes, officers arrived and the sheriff asked me to help figure out what happened. An ambulance took the body away while we discussed the fact the ripcord was still in Zacharias hand and his emergency chute had popped open by impact. The sheriff and I talked to those involved and were able to learn the victim had gone up with three friends from Calgary.

Those three jumped from 7,500 feet, but he had gone on up to 8,500 for a solo dive as part of earning his A-license. He had done some turns before beginning a front loop with less than 1,500 feet left. The only thing seeming to make sense was Kerry had become confused in his planned sequence and lost track of altitude.

Zacharias had 27 jumps to his credit and had been doing well, according to those who knew him. After the funeral, his parents contacted me and I helped them accept their son’s death. One of my pictures taken just before he took off was very sharp, and his parents appreciated the copy which shows him smiling and happy.

And that is the way I began eight years in the editor-janitor business.

G. George Ostrom is a national award-winning Hungry Horse News columnist. He lives in Kalispell.