A Nation Reflects: The 25th Anniversary of Columbine Episode Transcript
Content Warning: Guests are discussing the mass shooting at Columbine High School in 1999. Some of the discussion may be difficult to read.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Welcome to the Remembering a Life podcast. I'm your host, Gail Marquardt. From Remembering a Life. Each month we have a conversation with people in the death care and end of life space about life, death, and how we want to be remembered. Today we'll be reflecting on the 25th anniversary of the mass shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, and how funeral professionals helped families after their unfathomable and tragic losses. Please note the nature of this discussion and some of the content may be difficult to hear.
13 people were killed at Columbine High School on April 20th, 1999, the two assailants died by suicide and more than 20 others were injured. Victims of the Columbine shooting include Cassie Bernall, 17, Steven Curnow, 14, Corey DePooter, 17, Kelly Fleming, 16, Matthew Kechter, 16, Daniel Mauser, 15, Daniel Rohrbough 15, William Sanders, 47. Rachel Scott, 17, Isaiah Shoels, 18, John Tomlin, 16, Lauren Townsend, 18, and Kyle Velasquez 16. Please join me in 15 seconds of silence to honor them.
Today I'll be joined by three people who helped the families who lost a loved one that day. At the time, Chuck Bowman and John Horan were both funeral directors at Horan and McConaughy Funeral Home in Denver, Colorado. And Jennifer McBride was director of grief support and community education at the same funeral home. The funeral home was called upon to help seven of the families say goodbye to their loved ones in the days that followed. First we're joined by Chuck Bowman, currently a funeral director and owner of Hornung Family Funeral Home in Liberal, Kansas. Welcome, Chuck. I appreciate you being vulnerable and having this conversation because I know it isn't easy.
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Oh, thank you, Gail. It stirs up a lot of emotions when you bring this back up even 25 years later.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
I can imagine. How did you learn about the tragedy that was unfolding at Columbine High School on April 20th, 1999?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, I was returning from a graveside service at Fort Logan National Cemetery, which was over near Columbine High School, kind of a main street going over there, and I passed a couple of ambulances hauling the mail to get somewhere, didn't know anything about it, and I got back to the funeral home, was preparing to go on another service, and my office manager came to me and said, your brother's on the phone. And I thought, if he's on the phone, this isn't right. And so I took the call immediately and he, in a very panicked voice, said, where do your daughters go to school? Because I had daughters of the same ages that you just alluded to. And I said, well, they went to Highlands Ranch High School in Littleton. And he said, well, haven't you heard the news? And I said, no. And he informed me that there was shooting activity at Columbine High School.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So what happened then after you found out what had happened? How soon were you called upon to help?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, we were not called and I don't remember exactly, but we were not called upon for a couple of days. We sat there and the phone didn't ring, and we were just a little bit taken aback by that and now realize that families were being notified on the first day. After that there was no confirmations or identities made, and then the families in shock didn't reach out to funeral homes. So it was kind of silent for a couple of days there before the phone started to ring. Then when the phone started to ring, we were notified that we would help ended up six families and then a seventh a few days later.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So what were your roles in helping those families whose loved ones were killed?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, under the direction of John Horan, Daren Forbes, Kevin Caster and myself took on the responsibility for helping the families in need. And between the three of us mainly and John's support, we handled two a piece, making the arrangements as best we could with these poor, tragic families. And then we directed all six funerals that we were a part of.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
And over what period of time were those funerals held?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
It was about a 10 day period that we were involved for various reasons. Families wanted some funerals pretty rapidly, and others wanted to delay it. For what reasons I don't really remember, but it was about a 10 day process that we were working on nothing but Columbine, funerals and families and helping them in every aspect we possibly could.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That's a long time to be going through that process for the families, and I'm sure for you as funeral directors as well, to be kind of “on” that entire time for 10 days to be helping families under such tragic circumstances. How did you and your colleagues take care of yourselves while also caring for the families?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
We had ton of support. Jennifer McBride, our grief counselor, was there amongst us, and she kept checking on us as you can well imagine, six tragic deaths in an instant. Basically, we were so involved, so busy trying to get all of the details sorted out and worked out with everyone, the churches and pastors and musicians. And so it was emotional, but it was so hectic that we just kept going and we kept checking with each other. You okay? You okay? You doing all right? You need some rest? But we were just so focused that I guess we didn't realize how fast and furious we were going.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So then did it hit you more afterwards? What was that like once everything, once all the services were held, how did that feel then?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, I had one emotional breakdown during - one big emotional breakdown during the time we were serving families, but afterwards we did meet with a therapist to talk us through the post situation, and that helped tremendously. And again, we just kept supporting each other for months and months to come.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
What did you find the families needed the most? I can't even fathom what the families were going through, but how did you help navigate that and what did they need from you the most?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
They just needed our support. And of course, they were in such shock that in a lot of cases they just stare at you. They didn't really know what to ask. They didn't know really what to do. A lot of times you were working with extended families to try to get some answers. It just took a lot of patience. I think it took a lot more patience to work with these families because of the tragedy that this was, but they mostly just needed support that their children were okay, that they were in our care. We were doing the best for them. I'm very proud of our staff in the care center that took care of the preparation of the bodies, that we were able to view all of our victims, and that's so, so important. And the families were so in need of seeing their child and dealing with their grief that it was real and it was coming forth. And so I thought it was very important that we give them that opportunity. They were in shock and in deep grief, and we just did our best to support them and make their services for their children as meaningful as possible.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Did you also support other classmates of the people who died? I imagine a lot of them attended these funerals as well.
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, they did, and many of the classmates, many of the people in the community, we saw at all six funerals. They were so supportive and wanted to express their grief equally for each student that had died. It was an interesting time because before that time, if you had a death unrelated to Columbine, before Columbine occurred, the kids didn't know how to act when they came to a funeral for someone that had died in a car accident or a natural cause at a young age. And unfortunately by the end, we saw young people, 14, 15, 16, coming into the funeral home. They went over, signed the book, took a folder and went and were seated. Unfortunately, they learned very rapidly how to attend a funeral, and I can never get that image out of my head that they had to mature so quickly as far as going to funerals. I don't know if we helped them or hindered them in their growth of maturity, but that's one thing that really sticks out in my mind as we went through this.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Well, I'm sure as difficult as it was, that was probably the healthiest thing that they could have done to be a part of that process and say goodbye to their classmates.
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Absolutely. It was very important that they had that time and that time to share with each other, share with the family's the grief. We had several people that had white caskets that they could use a marker and write a sentiment on that casket, and they really adopted to that and wrote some beautiful, beautiful sentiments that they will always carry in their individual hearts, I think.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Yeah, that's a wonderful way to pay tribute. That's wonderful that they had that opportunity. I understand you also serve the family of one of the assailants. What was that like?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, that was mostly handled by John Horan, and I didn't really have much connection with that other than supporting John Horan. It was a difficult thing to do. The community was angry at them very much, and we had to tread lightly because we didn't want the families of the victims to feel like we were treating that victim equally to their child. That was a victim, but we were very careful to take care not to do that. But then in the end, we also realized that those parents lost their child and you couldn't help but feel sorry for them. It made the understanding of a situation so much more difficult because you had an evil image. And then you realized that these were innocent victims in a respect too, that their mental capacity wasn't proper, and so the parents were hurting as well.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Did the experience of serving families whose loved ones died that day affect how you approached your work as a funeral director after that?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
I think it probably did. Of course, for a long time, we had questions that people would ask of us either on the street, maybe in a funeral arrangement, maybe at a funeral, how did we do that, and so on and so forth. But I think it brought a deeper understanding of grief that families go through, and we really saw it during this tragic time, and I think we developed an understanding of how to care for families deep in grief.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So I've known you a good 10 years now, Chuck. During that time, many of your funeral service colleagues have experienced similar tragedies in their community. When other mass shootings happen, do you ever reach out to them to offer support and guidance? If so, what do you tell them?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
We've reached out to some of 'em, particularly immediately after Columbine, not so much today, but the one thing we learned is we had one double funeral. Two students had a mass together, and we kind of found that that wasn't a good thing to do because one student was pretty popular. The other student didn't have the camaraderie with other kids. And so of course, the one that was very popular and had the camaraderie got more attention than the other student, and we always felt like we had failed that family in a respect because their child did not get the same honor that the other child did. And so that's one of the things we learned. And as other tragedies happened, we tried to let the funeral homes know when they called for advice to not do that. We did reach out to them, they reached out to us, and we tried to give 'em our best advice to take a deep breath and take your time and care for each family and make it feel very individual that each family was getting taken care of in the same way, but it was also being taken care of in a personal fashion.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Yeah, that's so important. Do you have advice for other funeral directors? Have you given advice about how to take care of themselves?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
When I was on the board of the National Funeral Directors Association, one of my main goals was to instruct funeral directors that it was okay to grieve. It was okay to feel the pain, not to mask it or hide from it. I called it my campaign was kind of “scars of the heart.” I talked to many state associations about that, and I talked about that during my time on the board with many, many funeral directors. At many times, as a funeral director, you carry those memories of certain cases, certain situations, and of course, tragedy we're talking about today, and it's okay to feel the pain and it's okay to reach out. Most importantly, to get help if you need to talk to somebody, sometimes you just can't go through it. I had an episode where we were working to prepare a young lady for viewing, and there were several of us in the room getting her ready, and just all of a sudden it hit me like a brick, and I just lost sight of what I was doing.
And so I went outside with a cup of coffee and walked around the parking lot for about 20, 25 minutes, and my conversation started out that “Why in the world are you doing this? You've seen enough death after all your years in our service, you need to back away. It's time somebody else take over.” And as that conversation with myself went on, I realized that if I didn't do this, nobody else would. This was what I chose to do and I needed to walk forward with it. And I got myself turned around and went back to work, and nobody ever knew that that happened. That was the first time in my career - and the last time for that matter - I ever broke down, completely losing focus. And I realized then that there were times when you just needed to back away for a minute and collect your thoughts. And I hope that I've given some funeral directors the knowledge that it's okay. It's okay to cry and seek help.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
I definitely think you have. We always think about funeral directors. Well, they're trained to do this and they're trained to help families. They're trained to help prepare bodies so that families can say goodbye. But there's a lot more to it than that, and I don't know how there'd be any way how it couldn't affect you.
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, I don't either. We get kind of used to the natural deaths, the elderly deaths, even to some extent to children's deaths. But in the end, there's always that one, and it's not necessarily the deceased that causes that pain. Sometimes it's the family and funeral directors really need to be aware that it's okay to seek help.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So when you reflect on that tragedy 25 years ago, what has stayed with you and stayed with you? How have you continued to move forward? How are you doing now?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
There's certain things. April 20th is always a day that is a difficult day to make your way through it. You just never forget it. As they say one of those days that lives in infamy in your heart and your mind, I often will reflect back on Columbine. Somebody will ask me about Columbine and it brings it all back. And it's a very vivid memory of the tragedy. As you and I talk about it, I can see the situations and the activities and some of the things that we were going through, but I also reflect on it with an element of pride. Like I say, we did our best and I think we did very well to bring honor to each student and each student's families. So it's kind of a mixed emotion, but it's very, very sad.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Is there anything else that you'd like to share with us?
CHUCK BOWMAN:
Well, I guess the biggest thing I'd like to share is my hope that unfortunately, we've too often had these situations of recent years. I think Columbine was one of the first that started this rampage of shootings and things like that, but in our current era, but I think that my prayer would be that this stops. I think that we need to work on a lot of issues and mental health of everyone so that these things don't happen. And I guess when I reflect, that's one of the things I hope for that someday we'll have the mental health ability to cure some of this situation mentally.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Right. I couldn't agree more. Thank you again so much, Chuck, for joining me today and for sharing your story. I greatly appreciate it, and please continue to take care of yourself.
CHUCK BOWMAN:
I will, and it's my honor to help you in any way I can with this topic or any other for that matter. But thank you.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Thank you, Chuck. Have a wonderful day.
CHUCK BOWMAN:
You too, Dear.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Chuck, worked closely with John Horan, who still works at Horan and McConaughy funeral home, the funeral home he founded. John joins us now. Hi, John. Thank you for being part of this conversation.
JOHN HORAN:
I'm delighted to be here, Gail.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
How did you learn about the tragedy that was unfolding at Columbine High School?
JOHN HORAN:
It started in the morning with my pager going off incessantly. My partner, Daren Forbes and I were meeting with the family of a young man referred to us by hospice, and he wanted to talk to us before his death occurred and talk about his services. And naturally, Darren and I had to be on the conversation we were having at that time and were not able to respond to the constant barrage of notifications we were getting on our pagers. When we concluded, we got to the car and we made a phone call and learned about what had happened, and that Columbine High School is now surrounded by law enforcement, and apparently there were many deaths at that point. So that's how we learned. And from there we started to plan and think, well, okay, if we hear from families, how will we handle this?
GAIL MARQUARDT:
And Chuck mentioned that it took a couple days before you really started getting calls to help families. What was your role in helping those families?
JOHN HORAN:
My role was making sure that we had the right people in the right places, doing the right things. As it turned out, we heard from six families and four our one building in southwest Denver metro area. It was a lot to come at us at one time, let alone the fact that all the six of these were combined to be perhaps one of the greatest tragedies that we have ever experienced in our country. And so we planned for who would be seeing families who would be carrying out the arrangements, how we would utilize our building, how we would inform other families that we were serving at the time, and then the phone calls started coming in.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So I understand you also played a key role in serving the family of one of the assailants. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
JOHN HORAN:
Several days after this had happened, I was contacted by Martha Thayer, who at that time was the program director for the Mortuary Science Program at Arapaho Community College. Martha informed me that she worked with Dylan and the Klebolds wanted to talk to us. We met the Klebold family at a Denny's restaurant because they were being hounded by media. They were concerned about just driving into our facility and meeting with us there. So we started there in the booth at a restaurant and reassured them that we would keep this confidential and that we would take very good care of their son, and they put their trust in us, and we moved forward from there.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That must have been a very different experience for you as a funeral director. You really had to, I imagine, set aside very strong feelings that you had yourself in order to really help the family.
JOHN HORAN:
Absolutely. Having said that, our job in funeral service is not to stand in judgment of people. It's to be there to help people cope with some of the most difficult and painful times of their lives. And that's how it was for Sue and Tom Klebold and their family and those who cared about them, their closest friends. So we made a plan to see the family and to carry out the services by utilizing another one of our facilities on the opposite side of the Denver area. Both Martha and I met with the family and their Lutheran minister, who was quite an extraordinary man. I remember Tom saying, “After what Dylan has done, we're not entitled to have a service for him.” And I remember saying, but you must. And then the, because Dylan, it doesn't change the fact that Dylan is your son and you loved him and you love him, and you owe this to yourselves and those who care about you and about Dylan. The Lutheran minister chimed in and said, “John is absolutely right.” We have to have a service. It's important to say goodbye. So we arranged to have the service in a state room in that building, which is the family and their closest friends led by their minister. It was a touching and beautiful service. Tom, the father, wanted to go with us the entire way, and at the conclusion of the service, he went with us down to the crematory, helped us place Dylan into the crematory and stood by as we started the retort. We never put this on our daily schedule.
We were being hounded by media, and I was so concerned that somehow word was going to get out, and the fact that we had not put this on our schedule and only a handful of people in the entire company at that time, we had 120 or so staff members. And the fact that only a handful of people knew that we were caring for the Klebolds just made it easier to contain this. And it did make it possible for their service to be private. And I think that was something that was so, so important to them to be able to just have some private time and to not be hounded by the media.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Well, you were able to provide them with what they needed at an incredibly painful moment in their lives, and that's really important. What did you find that all of the families really needed during this time?
JOHN HORAN:
I'm glad you asked that question. What they needed more than anything was to see and believe. What we know intellectually so often does not align with what's going on in our gut, in our heart that says, this can't be true. Every single family we served viewed their child. It was so important for them to have that closure at that moment to align what they knew intellectually with what their gut was disbelieving. Secondly, the six victims that we cared for, all the families chose burial. I thought that was interesting because we're in a metropolitan area where the cremation rate was very, very high 25 years ago. And it was interesting for families to share with us that while they might choose cremation for themselves, they wanted burial for their child. That was one more, that was something that they just felt they needed. Every single family took advantage of an opportunity to say goodbye. And I know you've heard from Chuck and from Jennifer on how this took place and how important it was to customize this and make this special for each family.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Did the experience of serving families whose loved ones died that day affect how you approached your work as a funeral director after that? How did this experience impact you and your work?
JOHN HORAN:
In several ways. First and foremost was to recognize the extreme emotional burden that our staff members were carrying as a result of this. One of my takeaways from this was that later when we had another situation like this, caring for a number of children that died in the theater shootings in Aurora, it was important to me to be sure that we divided this so that not too much fell on one particular staff member. So we brought in staff members from throughout the company to see families so that our staff members were serving only one family at a time at Columbine. People like Chuck served several families. And the cumulative emotional burden of that is not to be underestimated for how powerful that is. And when we hired a psychiatric nurse to come in and talk to us, it was so apparent how important it was for people to be able to unload their feelings because they felt like they were in a position where they had to contain those feelings to their family and to their coworkers and be strong and all that sort of thing. But it was so revealing to me about how important it is to allow for an opportunity for our people to take care of themselves. While we were caring for these families, I brought in a massage therapist and she did share massages for staff members. I made sure that we had food and drink for staff because they were under so much stress and so much going on that to get away and take a break just really wasn't very feasible.
So it's a huge takeaway for me that yes, it's very, very important to be focused the families that we're serving, but don't underestimate the importance of taking care of our people, of our staff members who are in the thick of it.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
I imagine no amount of training in mortuary science school can prepare you for the reality of something like this.
JOHN HORAN:
No, absolutely not. I mean, at mortuary science school, we learn a lot of information that enables us to pass a national board exam, and yet the reality of what it's like to serve families under a situation like this is really not something that is ever addressed. So it really sort of comes down to, and to some extent, all of us have had some experience in serving families under traumatic situations, so we know what that's like, but not so many at one time. And that's what makes this so different.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
What other takeaways did you have from this? What else? How else has it affected you and your work?
JOHN HORAN:
One of the things that I think is essential is to be sure and designate somebody who's going to be a spokesperson to the media and provide regular updates so that they're not constantly calling us. So we collected the various members of the media that wanted updates, and then I would write it up a short update on service times and that sort of thing and send it out to the media so they knew, and of course, I'm only sending out the information that we were allowed to publicly disseminate, but by doing that, we eliminated the barrage of phone calls that we were getting. I mean, we had two staff members in the front office and the phones would just not stop ringing for those two. And it was largely media calling, asking questions, wanting updates. And so one takeaway is to get out in front of that and designate a media spokesperson who provides regular updates. Another thing we learned was the importance of having a local law enforcement officer at the funeral home's front door. We posted a sign at the door and the sign said, no photographs is this for family and friends. Only others must check the office before proceeding.
And I remember one day we were advised by someone who was there for one of the visitations that there was somebody in one of the state rooms who was attempting to take a photograph of the deceased. And so obviously, and this person represented one of those sensational media outlets that this is what they do. In any event, after that occurred, we asked the Lakewood Police Department to post an officer at the front door and to question anybody who came through the door who did not seem like they were there for the right reason. Another takeaway, which I didn't think of very much at the time, and I can tell you it's made a huge impression on me and I think about it now, is to avoid combining deaths under these kinds of circumstances into a group funeral.
I so recall one of the families that we served, there was a funeral for three of the victims at a church in the area. And that family was extremely disappointed that they felt that their daughter was not given a proper consideration that she deserved, that this daughter may not have been the most popular girl, or she wasn't involved in a lot of the groups or sports or that kind of thing. And the family just felt that they got shorted. And so we just have to remember that each family is entitled to ceremony, to ritual that's purely dedicated to their loved one. I have been a strong advocate to ensure that that does not happen again. But another takeaway is that in addition to a large public funeral, we can offer a private service that allows the family to be exclusively with the people they know and care about the most. So if there is a large public funeral scheduled, okay, fine, but we also want to make sure that that family knows that we can facilitate a private service just for the people that they know and care about the most.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
As you would with any funeral. Your focus was really on ensuring that the family received the kind of tribute and were able to plan the service that was most appropriate for them, whether it was just a small private service or whether they opened it up to more people. And it didn't even occur to me that you'd have to protect their privacy from things like the media. So I can only imagine the amount of work that went into each service and making it meaningful and still protecting the families.
JOHN HORAN:
Absolutely. I mean, obviously these aren't things that we're trained to do as funeral directors, but it certainly came through loud and clear for me and continues to be something that I think about when there is an extreme tragic situation is making sure that we advocate for the needs of the family, that we don't sort of allow public sentiment or outside sentiment drive the decisions, all the decisions that are being made here. We need to be sure that we're doing the things for this family that will help them cope, things that give them meaning. And the last thing that we want is for the family to feel like they've been forced to go through a situation where it's all superficial. They deserve better.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Chuck and I talked a little bit about the fact that mass shootings have unfortunately become all too common, and I imagine that you interact with other funeral directors throughout the country when this happens in other cities. What's the one piece of advice that you think is most critical to offer those funeral directors?
JOHN HORAN:
Slow down. Don't rush anything. Remember that your staff members carry the burden of this. Also divide and conquer, if you will. My dear friends, the Carmens in Connecticut talked about after the school shooting there that the long term emotional and mental effects that this has brought about for their staff members. And I can certainly identify with that. And I think as particularly as funeral home owners and leaders in our companies, we need to make sure that we look after our people.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
And you're talking about the shooting in Newtown, correct?
JOHN HORAN:
Correct. We also have to remember that the people who provide the care for the deceased, seeing things such as wounds coming through hands, that sort of thing that indicate they had their hands up when they were shot. I mean, those kinds of things. That has a huge … we do a great job of covering that up so that families in the public don't see that, but we see it and it's not like we can just snap our fingers and forget it.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Right. Yeah. I think most of us can't even fathom what that's like for you, caring for families and their loved ones. So it's been 25 years now. What has stayed with you and how have you continued to move forward in your role as a funeral? And personally?
JOHN HORAN:
I'm trying to remember the things that we learned from that experience and to apply it to the other traumatic situations that we deal with. For example, recently we had a funeral director who it seemed like she saw one tragic situation after another. And I talked with her supervisor and we agreed that let's do what we can to try to give this person some space to see families who their loved one has died after at a ripe old age. And those kinds of arrangements are when families can come in and they can laugh and they can share wonderful stories and those kinds of things that sometimes we need to be very, very sensitive to give our people some yin to the very difficult yang that they've had to deal with.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Is there anything else that you reflect on or that you'd like to share in honor of this anniversary?
JOHN HORAN:
Sue Klebold wrote a book and in her book, she talked about the care that Martha Thayer and I provided and how much it meant to her at that time. It's one of those things that you look back on and you think, well, this is what we do. This is what we signed up for when we came into this field. But once in a while, it's awfully nice to get some very positive feedback from my family who, especially under tragic circumstances, who says that what you did made a very important difference in our lives that helped us to cope with the worst thing that we possibly could have ever imagined. Thank you.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
I can see why that would stay with you. Thank you so much, John, for joining us today and sharing your story about serving families after such incredible unfathomable loss. I think I speak for the nation when I say how grateful we are to you for the work that you and your colleagues do under such incredibly difficult circumstances. So thank you.
JOHN HORAN:
I appreciate that. It's been my honor, and I know I can speak for my coworkers. I'm saying it was their honor as well.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Thank you, John.
JOHN HORAN:
Take care.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Jennifer McBride served as Director of Grief Support and Community Education at Horan and McConaty Funeral Home at the time of the shooting. She joins us now to talk about her experiences on the day of the shooting and in the days and weeks that followed from the perspective of a grief professional. Thank you so much for joining me today, Jennifer.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Thank you. I I'm honored to be included.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So how did you learn about the tragedy that was unfolding at Columbine High School that day?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
I was driving toward a lunchtime appointment on I 25, one of our main highways, and I was so aware all of a sudden of so many sirens and ambulances and police cars, and it just seemed like there was this intense energy that was happening. I don't tend to listen to the radio in the car or any of those things, but there was just a sense of alarm. And when I got back to the funeral home, I learned more about what was happening and the news coverage was going on, and then we started waiting for what might happen, who might come.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So Chuck was telling us earlier that it took a couple days to really start to serve the families. What was your role in helping families and even the community after the shooting?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Well, we did wait because it took so much time in terms of the police investigation before they would release the bodies of those who died. So it was really an intense moment, certainly for us, but also for those families to not know the fate of their children. I think that was a huge part of the waiting that happens in my role as director of grief support and community education. I had internal service to our staff, family, and then I also had external service to the families of those for whom we were caring as well as the rest of our community. And really it was such a shock to our entire nation. As you noted too, being such a seminal moment when it seemed like the world changed.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
What was your role as the family started to plan services? How did you assist with that? How did you help them?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
A lot of what I did at that point too is our funeral directors were on the front lines with the families and all of the families had victim advocates that were assigned to them. So it was not my role to step in and take the place of those victim advocates. A lot of what I found myself doing was, when you think about Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, it was very important that I make sure that all of our directors and staff members who were at the Wadsworth location, which is where we cared for almost all of the victims and their families, was making sure that people had some lunch, that people sat down and ate together, making sure that people took a moment that we remembered to connect with each other, that we remembered to go outdoors. It can be so, so overwhelming when those things happen.
And then listening to our care center staff listening to their concerns for us to have so many young people with such unprecedented levels of physical trauma at one time was overwhelming. So I had my background as a thanatologist in study death, grief and bereavement, and my master's in pastoral ministry. But I felt like a lot of what it was important for me to do is go and connect face-to-face with the people who were called on to the front lines at that time. In a way, I found myself sort of being the mom, just making sure everyone was okay, had something to eat and drink. And then as we started to serve the families, as they started to come in, it was being with people the very first time they saw their children. Every single one of those families needed to, demanded to, be able to view their children. And that was so incredibly important. But being with those people in those moments as they hesitantly entered the chapel or one of the rooms and having a rolling chair nearby in case somebody's knees went out from under them were moments I will never forget. And such intimate and powerful moments to walk in with people.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So how, through all of that, you're obviously trained to work with people during times of bereavement, but I imagine you also needed to care for yourself. How did you do that?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
One of the things I wanted to make a point about is that shock is so powerful and can sometimes help us survive the most horrible experiences. It's an energy that helps us get through. But I was really surprised that our, one of the newspapers, I think it was two days after the shooting happened, had a headline that said The Healing Begins, which was startling for me because I thought the shock of the tragedy had only begun to sink in. We sometimes tend in our society to want to rush to heal when we haven't really even taken in the depth of what has happened. Does that make sense?
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Definitely. And yes, as a nation, we all grieved together after this shooting. And even 25 years later, I think we're still grieving. We're still healing.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Yes. And I was also thinking of one quote from Dr. Alan Wolfelt that mourning is grief gone public. Everyone grieves, but not everyone mourns invites the community and that kind of thing. William Worden talks about the tasks of mourning or the work of grief, and it is confronting the reality of the death, expressing the feelings, finding meaning, and then from those integrating the loss into our lives. And when that newspaper said the healing begins, many people have not even yet had the opportunity to confront the reality of the death, which for many families was being able to see their children. That was such a very important thing and took such great courage for those families to be able to do that and incredible work on the part of our care center team to make that possible, not to hide what had happened, but to allow them to have a different image than what had been in their minds as they waited for the bodies to be released.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So now it's 25 years later, and I remember on that day in 1999, I was holding my three week old son watching everything unfold on tv. For those of us who are old enough to remember this event, how do you think it affected our grief after subsequent mass shootings, which have become unfortunately increasingly common? Do we still grieve the way we did after Columbine?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
It's interesting too, as I was reflecting on this, I was thinking we did not, back then, we did not all have smartphones and constant input from media at our fingertips. Unfortunately, as you said, these things happen with more frequency and our social media connections keep us constantly informed. But that idea that every loss brings back all the other losses. I remember when after Columbine, when the Virginia Tech shooting happened, it was so important to me to go to each of our folks who had been on the front lines of Columbine, because you can't help but have flashbacks. Remember, we're sensory beings, and those are things that are things we see and smell and taste and touch and hear, and they come back. And then with Sandy Hook and the Aurora shooting and Uvaldi, our hearts always go back to those people. Sometimes I think people, it's overload. There is so much suffering in the world right now that I think so many people are on overload, and it almost becomes impossible to hear and see and get in touch with those things. I think we all go right back to where we were when these things happened and the previous things that we may have connected with.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Yeah. I'm curious the whole concept of whether our grief response has evolved and has it been for better or for worse? I think there's a tendency now to, with these events and mass shootings being more common to want to retreat. Whereas 25 years ago, we were intently focused on what was happening at Columbine.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
But I also think we've become better at, when I think about the memorials expressing emotions, I think our community, when we see roadside memorials here where you only saw them in certain areas of the country, and I think we have become more open to grieving and mourning. 25 years ago, we did not have Heartlight Center, which is the nonprofit grief support center that we created that started in 2001. And had we had that, then we would have had open door grief support like we did after the Aurora theater shooting. I think that I've noticed law enforcement and others have become more open to the importance of talking about these things as professionals talking about these things as families, parents talking to their children. I think that some of the tragedies have also opened conversations that people may not have had before.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That's definitely a step in the right direction. It's unfortunate that tragedy has to get us there. You mentioned the Aurora shooting. Were you with Horan & McConaty when they handled the cases from that shooting as well?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Yes.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
How was that different? How was that different? Was it different?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
It was different. We cared for seven of those who died in the Aurora theater shooting. It was a different thing with Columbine. It was all within that school community, so people knew one another. Families knew one another. With the Aurora theater shooting, it was people who were all in a movie theater who did not necessarily have the interconnections that the Columbine families did. But I think as a company, we learned a great deal from Columbine that informed the way that how we served after the Aurora Theater shooting, we made sure that each director had one family to serve and not multiple families, because with Columbine, that became a little overwhelming at times. We wanted to make sure that people had some time off. And then also honoring all of the rest of our staff family that needed to care for all the other families who had deaths that occurred, who needed the same level of care and compassion as the ones that were more involved in the media. In the news.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
I've heard that funeral directors who've experienced serving families who've been involved in a mass fatality event have advised other funeral directors after that who've experienced something similar that one funeral director should work with one family. And I imagine that's, as you mentioned, for the benefit of the family and for the benefit of the funeral director and their own ability to cope with the circumstances.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Yeah, and I think it's information that was hard won in a way by noticing the difficulties, some of the struggles that people had because of that stress. One of the things that felt very important that we did after Columbine was a dear friend of mine who had been our first Heartlight Center board chair as a clinical psychiatric nurse, and we had Mary come in and sit with all of our folks who had been on the front line with Columbine and do a debriefing session talk with all of us. It needed to not be me at that point because I was in that as well too. And it was great to be able to lean on some other professionals to help to care for our staff family.
One other thing, Gail, I'm realizing I didn't talk about is in terms of the external part of how I was involved in the community was that we had friends who came, our friends Joy and Laura Johnson from Centering Corporation in Omaha drove boxes and boxes of grief support materials, and we were able to put notices in the newspaper that people could come and pick up information at any of our locations because we found that, again, that idea that every loss brings back the other losses, we found people going over things in their lives that other losses they had had that had not been grieved or mourned in the way that they needed to. And this kind of prompted a grief response in them. I went to some of the churches in the Columbine area to do some listening sessions with congregations, some of my colleagues, some of the pastors that I knew had been at the buses that were bringing kids from the school to where they could reunite with parents, and those pastors needed to have a debriefing experience about what it was like to be in that moment. It was really something to find the places that we were asked to come and help and be part of things.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That's really interesting. So it went way beyond what we were reading in the news to other grief responses that perhaps were very unexpected on behalf of people who hadn't taken the opportunity to grieve whatever loss that might be.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Oh, yes, very much so.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Wow.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Very much so. One of the other things I did was I created a memorial that's framed at our Wadsworth building that is a shadow box that has folders, pins, photos, all kinds of bits of memorials from the people that we cared for and the services that we were part of. One of the ways I cared for myself was having my best friend come and help on three services. We needed people, we needed hands, we needed people handing out folders, being at viewings, being at services, and having her walk together with me and just be there was a great help. She had my back.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So was it difficult for family members to be involved in the services? To what extent were family members involved in the service the day of, or was that too difficult?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
No, the families, my experience was the families were very much involved. And to me that is to the credit of each of the funeral directors who were caring for those families. They supported, invited, cared for the families to step into things that nobody wants to step into. But I think that that is to the credit of the things that John Horan had always taught, all of us about being there in some of the most difficult times in people's lives. And the care and compassion among all of Chuck and Darren and Kevin and all of the directors was incredibly important and allowed those families to be able to do things that nobody ever wants to do.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
And I imagine not only the families, but their fellow classmates. Chuck mentioned earlier in the episode that some of the caskets were white and people could write a message to their family member, their classmate, whatever their relationship might be. What did you see among fellow students who attended funerals?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
And again, this goes to the fact that with Columbine, it was all within that community. There was such connection and love and support. There was so much embracing. It was very powerful. And when Chuck mentioned that that was one family who was able to view their child and one bit of protection that they felt like they could do was then to close her casket and invite them to use those markers. And when we got to the cemetery, it took time for all of those cars and procession to get there. But then watching the family walk all the way around the casket very slowly as it was over the grave space reading and looking at all that was written and drawn around there, I will never forget seeing that happen.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Wow, that sounds incredibly powerful.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
It's also good to talk about that people when they are grieving, some people are more intuitive grievers, so more emotionally based, more emotionally expressive, and others can be more instrumental grievers. So action oriented grievers. Does that make sense to you when I say that?
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Yeah, that does make sense. And I imagine it's no different here that everyone grieves at their own pace. Everyone grieves in their own way. It may have taken it a year or more for some people to really start to be able to move forward in their grief journey, I would imagine.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Absolutely. Our grief experience, our grief journey is as different as our fingerprints. We all have them, but they, none of them are the same. And I think about when other tragedies happen, families from Columbine reached out to families in other communities. Some people, some of the parents who created foundations who are locally here in Aurora, Tom Sullivan, whose son Alex died in the theater shooting and has run for public office. I mean, people do this in their own way. Again, when I go back to Worden's tasks of mourning, finding meaning and finding out what is it that you do with that?
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So how about you? How have you found meaning over the last 25 years? What has stayed with you? What are you doing today and how are you perhaps continuing to honor all of those students who died that day?
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
These are seminal experiences that never leave you. Again, we're sensory beings. The experiences of all of that is like a taste that comes back. Those things stay in ourselves, and it took me right back to that time. I mean, we had a spring snow here a week or so ago, and we had an April snow after the Aurora theater shooting, and those sensory things bring that back. It was powerful to walk through those memories, and I found myself feeling the difficulties of that, but also the power of that and very thankful for the opportunities to be with people. Again, as John says, in some of the most difficult times of their lives. I mean, my heart goes out to each person and family when these events occur, and also to the funeral service folks and grief support caregivers who will be called upon to care for their community.
It's interesting. John and I had an opportunity to speak to the Association for Death Education and Counseling program. We called it “After Columbine,” and to be able to raise awareness. Many people never thought about the funeral service folks who were caring for each of those families and each of those loved ones who were killed. Now, I still conduct services as a certified celebrant, and I still think that all I have learned from the people with whom I have served, my colleagues like Chuck and John and so many others, the people we cared for put not only the body of those they have loved in our hands, but they also put their hearts into our hands. That is such a sacred trust that I've been honored to receive for 25 years, and then for the past three years that I've been, am I retired.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
We were talking about this earlier, Chuck and I, about the fact that funeral directors are trained to do this, but there's no way that dealing with these kinds of situations in particular can't be impactful. And I'm so grateful to Chuck and John for being vulnerable and talking about that and to you for talking about your experiences as well. I really appreciate you sharing your story and talking about how funeral service came together collectively to help following Columbine and the subsequent mass shootings that we've experienced as a nation. Thank you so much for joining us today. I really appreciate it.
JENNIFER MCBRIDE:
Thank you.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Thank you to all three of our guests for joining me today. Regardless of the amount of time that passes, reflecting on events like this is never easy. I appreciate Chuck, John, and Jennifer and their willingness to be vulnerable in sharing their stories with us today. And thank you to all three of you for your service to families during some of their darkest days. To learn more about remembering loved ones, visit remembering a life.com.