A Life Changing Event

On June 24, 1963 I fell asleep at the wheel, hit a bridge breaking off the corner, the car flew through the air around 80 feet, landed on its top smashing the top down to the seats, and then flipped back over onto its wheels. My wife and little 10 month girl were both instantly killed. It was a miracle that I survived such a mangled car. I spent 2 1/2 months in the hospital and 2 1/2 months in a body cast.

After almost 48 years I made a trip back to the bridge and went to the local paper and got a copy of the article printed on June 27, 1963.

As printed on June 27, 1963.

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A speeding car that left the highway and hurtled 82 feet across a dry creek, eight and one forth miles south of Smith Center on US-281, about 2 a.m. Monday morning caused the deaths of two persons and the critical injury of the third, the driver. All were from Osborne.

Killed instantly were Mrs. Ester Ruth Alflen 23, and daughter, Valerie, The husband and father, Gerald "Gary" Alflen, 19, driver, was critically injured with fractures of the right leg and collar bone and three ribs in addition to cuts, bruises and contusions.

Mrs. Alflen and daughter were both thrown from the car and Mrs. Alflen was pinned beneath the car which landed on its top, then rolled back on its wheels. Mr. Alflen thinks he crawled from the battered car after the accident. How he did it, considering the condition of the car and his injuries, is a mystery.

It was almost four hours after the accident, about 5:45a.m., before it was discovered by John Watkins, a young man from Harlan, who was coming to Smith Center.

Mr Alflen said he vainly tried to hail cars that sped by during the early morning hours.

The car going south, pulled to the left north of the Dry Creek bridge and snapped off five or six of the guard rail posts that were inked together by cable. Then it hit the edge of the concrete banister and smashed it off before taking off its 82-ft. catapult through space and across the creek.

It is believed that Mr. Alflen went to sleep, causing him to lose control of the car.

Mr. and Mrs. Alflen and daughter were on their way home from a vacation trip to Puyallup, Wash., where they visited his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd Alflen. They left their car in Kearney, Nebr. and made the trip by train. Arriving back in Kearney early Monday morning, they got their car and started for home. Mr. Alflen was employed by McFarland's store and was scheduled to go to work at 7:00 a.m.

Corland Brown, deputy sheriff, said he found a note beside the car, evidently placed inside by people where the car was left in Kearney, something like this---Better come in and spend the night and drive home in the daytime.

Mrs. Alflen, Ester Ruth, daughter of the Rev. and Hrs. Harold Hollis was born at McCracken, October 19, 1939. She came to Osborne with her parents and sister, Marie, March 25, 1954. She graduated from Osborne Rural high school in 1957and then attended Evangel college at Springfield, Mo. Then she took a beauty course in Salina and opened her own shop in Osborne. On June 11 1961 she was married to Mr. Alfen.

Valerie Ruth was born in August 1963.

Mr. Alflen was brought to the local hospital where he remained a patient until Wednesday forenoon. Then he was removed to Hays Hospital.

Memorial services for Mrs. Alflen and Valerie Ruth will be held Friday after noon at 2:00 o'clock at the Assembly of God church in Osborne.

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This was a lift changing event that will be engraved on my mind forever.

Holes in My Heart

After all these years as one becomes a Senior Citizen I noticed that you can’t do all the things that you use to do when you were young. As I thought about it I have come to the conclusion that this is caused by the accumulation of the many holes that one acquires in the heart. The more holes that you have the more that you lose that energy and fortitude to accomplish tasks that you would have done in your earlier years. So here is my rendition of what I call Holes in my Heart.

In 1950 as a boy of seven years old the first event happened to me. The traumatic thing I remember was when my Granddad Knoll died. It was hard for me at that young age to understand what had just happened. I heard my parents talking about if I was old enough to go to the funeral. So we all packed into this church and they talked about my granddad Knoll and that he wasn’t with us anymore. At the close of the funeral we all went by his casket where there he lay asleep. They explained that I couldn’t see him anymore and that he was now in heaven. That was my first funeral that I remember and will never forget. Even though it was traumatic for me I believe it was good for me to learn about life and death at an early age. This was my first hole that I acquired in my heart.

My grandma Alflen, Blanche, was about everything to us all. Growing up we spent many days at our grandparents house. She was always there for help in the greenhouse and always had the meals prepared on time. I remember those special tastes that only she could prepare. Fried potatoes served with meat and vegetables. She had a special way to prepared sweet potatoes. She would boil them in the skins, peel, cut into half inch strips, coat them with sugar and fry until golden brown. To this day I can’t seem to duplicate that taste. For breakfast it was usually bacon and eggs with pancakes. I don’t know if granddad realized it , but she was always there for him even if he was at times harsh to her. She always attended church every week and I can still see her reading her bible and praying for all of us. Later in life she became ill and was in the hospital with pneumonia. Mom and I was there with her as she got worse and was unconscious. She would forget to breath so we would have to tell her to take another breath. The next morning in 1960, she past in her sleep . The family gathered from New York, California, and Washington as they had spread across this nation. This was the first time all the siblings had been together since they had left home on there own. It’s a shame that sometimes it takes a funeral for family to get together. This was the second hole placed in my heart.

In June of 1963 I had two more holes added to my heart. After being married in June of 1961 and having a baby girl born in Aug of 1962, we had made a trip to Washington State to visit my parents. After two weeks of vacation, we boarded the train for home and settled in learning to sleep to the clikity clack of the train track. We arrived in Kearney Nebraska late in the evening and set off for the 100 mile trip home. About eight miles south of Smith Center Kansas I fell asleep at the wheel, hit a bridge, and landed across a creek bed on the top of the car and then back on its wheels. When I came too I could see the stars and hear the popping of metal. I tried to stand up and found that my leg wouldn’t hold me and that I didn’t have any control of it. I took the weight off of it and stood on the leg that wasn’t broken. After lifting my leg out of the car, I landed on the ground in a heap. I was in shock and felt no pain yet. I had been looking for my family and to my horror I found my wife under the car except for her feet and my 10 month old daughter was a few feet away laying there silent, I knew then they were both gone. That morning under the bridge changed my life and a certain part of me died that day giving me two of the largest holes in my heart. They were buried in a casket together and later I put on the grave marker, together in birth, together in life, and together in death and eternity.

Later in the fall of 1963 as I was still recuperating from my car accident and in a body cast, I received a call that my Granddad Alflen had collapsed and to come right away. When I got there they said he had died in the bathroom. I was 20 by this time and the only relative in town so they wanted me there. I was told that when they were going to remove his body from the bathroom that I could leave but I thought I owed my granddad the dignity to stay with him. As they couldn’t get the gurney in the bathroom they had to put a blanket under him and carry him out. Granddad was a little on the heavy side so as they brought him out, his head would bang on the floor. Even though I knew he wasn’t there it bothered me to hear that thud. I was able to say my goodbye and then began calling relatives about the bad news. Granddad Alflen was very special to me as he had taught me many things about living life and how to deal with the many roads of life to follow. He was a self taught farmer and had a large greenhouse and even though he had only completed the third grade he was a very successful business man. To this day I miss him greatly. So 1963 had ripped three more holes in my heart.

In 1976, Dad was just 53 years old and had been having trouble with symptoms that should have told us that he had a problem with his heart. He had pains in his shoulder, nauseous , and other signs that at the time we didn’t pick up on. On that February morning, Dad decided to go with our neighbor to cut some firewood. They were always competitive about there different brands of chain saws, so when it came time to cut wood they proceeded to race to see which saw could cut wood the fastest. Dad suddenly had a severe heart pain and announced that he wanted to go home. After arriving home he proceeded to take a shower and drink something to settle his stomach. He was still having problem with heart pain but didn’t want to go the hospital. After some coaching he finally agreed to go. As they were checking him out in the emergency room and hooking him up to the different machines he suddenly had a massive heart attack and even though he was in the hospital they were unable to save him. I remember that morning as if it was yesterday. Before Dad had left for his wood cutting event, he waved to me from across the pasture. I was working on something in the back yard and waved back, thinking about what I was doing and not really giving him the time of day. Later on that evening we had went out to dinner and had arrive home when there came a knock on our door. My uncle Daune was there with this terrible look on his face letting us know that Dad had pasted away. This was such a shock to the whole family as he was so young and active. Here I was at the age of 33 burying my dad and looking at my life with idea that I might only have as few as 20 years left in my life. This was another mile stone that changes how you look at your life and put another big rip in my heart.