This autobiography is dedicated to my descendents.  You never know what hiccup in life will forever change the events downstream (the fact that you are here to read this).  This autobiography chronicles all the events that shaped my life and outcome, as well as your beginnings.  It’s usually the negative turns in life that shape our destiny.

Chapter 1: 400 Years in the Making!

To the best of my research, it started almost 400 years ago in France when Mathurin Bregevin was born.  Mathurin and Marie Tesnier had only one son Jean before Mathurin lost his life (and a daughter) in a fire.  Somehow the word “fire” will appear a lot in this story.

At an early age, Jean Bergevin dit Langevin (the first name change) left whatever family he had in Angers, France for New France (Canada) on August 17, 1665 as a soldier in the Carnigan-Salieres Regiment.  Jean retired from military life and married Marie Piton (one of the Daughters of the King) and started a legacy that would span hundreds of thousands of descendents (some famous like Sir Hector Langevin, some infamous like the almost hung Charles Bergevin).  They were one of the original 700 families that founded Canada and lived on the second of the only two “pie parcels” in Quebec (lot #720), which is still in the family today, I hope it is in your day.

Jean and Marie started with 10 children (3 died early) and 58 grandchildren.  The legacy grew and migrated until one descendent, Louis Langevin (the “Bergevin dit” was dropped), migrated from French speaking Montreal to English speaking Logan (near Mitchell, Ontario).  This occurred about 1853, 100 years before I would be born.  The name changed to Longeway until my grandfather Michael John II (Jack) had some misspelling along the way, and it finally ended as Longeuay (some of my second cousins are Longeways).  Louis and Euphrosine (Fressin) Grioux started their own herd of 11 children and 60 grandkids.  Nothing like good catholics to keep the population growing.

So much for the family name history.  As for life history, not much is recorded since the fire in France.  The old Longeway homestead in Logan stayed in the family until 1993 when cousin Flo (in the video of the house I have) passed away and it was sold to strangers.  From here, the stories were passed down from father to child, so take them with a grain (or bucket) of salt.

Grandpa Jack migrated from Logan to Ontario for work in the early 1920’s when the automotive business came across the river to Canada.  He had several jobs, the one he like the most was working at Jack Daniels on the river across from Detroit.  No, it wasn’t a sampling job, but that didn’t stop grandpa.  I don’t know how Grandpa Jack met Grandma Angela Jacquemain, but it didn’t take them long to start their legacy.  Fourteen kids and 60 grandkids (again!).  The amazing part is that the age spread from the oldest sibling (Jack Jr.) to the youngest (Teresa) is only 22 years (no twins).  Or even more amazing is the age spread from the oldest grandchild (Harry Ellis) to the youngest (Barbara Bujak) of the 60 grandkids is only 24 years.  Didn’t anyone take a breather!

Life in the roaring 1920’s was anything but roaring.  Everything was scarce; jobs, money, and food.  With the family growing, the eldest had to quit school, go to work, and help support everything, or else.  My dad, Don, was the second oldest.  His older brother, Jack Jr., went into the Navy and didn’t return for decades.  Don was left as the next wage earner before he could even graduate high school.

Don’s first cousin (and best friend) Bill Carrol (on the Jacquemain side) told me that Don was nicknamed “Rubber”.  Whatever anyone could throw at Don, he’d take it and bounce right back.  There’s some DNA that was passed down the family tree.

With a 6th grade education, Don worked and worked, providing for his family.  Always looking in on his cousins, uncles and aunts, Don was the patriarch of the immediate family. Then came the Korean war.  As with anyone concerned with freedom, Don went across the border to sign up with the Americans.  He didn’t have to join – it was the right thing to do (more DNA being passed).  Because Grandma Angela Jacquemain was American, all of her kids had dual citizenship, and could come and go as they please.  Don was only armed with a pistol on the front lines, since he was the radio operator.  Luckily, the good guys won that battle.  Don’s homecoming port was Los Angeles before returning to Canada.

As it turned out, Don’s second cousin Mary Lou Jacquemain Brown also lived in Los Angeles.  It was the 4th of July and with the war over, parties were everywhere.  Mary Lou set up a blind date between Don and soon to be mom (Peggy Flanagan).  The entire gang was suppose to party at the beach, but somehow Don and Peggy got separated from the group and had their own beach party.  Peggy’s mom Nora Foley Flanagan was pretty upset when Don finally brought Peggy home at 3:00 in the morning.  That blind date was blind love as they married less than 6 months later.

So by what originally appeared as a simple blind date for a military man on his way home, ended up as the beginning of your legacy.  Big thanks to Mary Lou!

So hopefully this won’t sound too bizarre, but if it wasn’t for the Korean war, you and I would never have been born.

Nine months after the wedding was brother Mike’s appearance into the world, and two years later I came into existence.  Now for my tales and tribulations.

Chapter 2: The Early Years (Pre-Teenager)

I’ll have to jump ahead 18 years so you’ll understand why this chapter is so short.  I’ll explain in more detail later, but the plane crash wiped out 90% of my early childhood memories, so bear with me.

The few memories are the traumatic ones.  Don could make the most money in sales, and being as personable as he was (Rubber), did great in sales.  The only problem was you have to follow the sales.  So there was a lot of moving around in the pre-college years.  Somehow we ended up in Covina.  Remember the word “fire”?

It was the summer of 1958.  It wasn’t my birthday yet, only 4.  And by now, the folks had grown tired of my pyrotechnic adventures, like setting the curtains on fire, etc.  And since I was an early riser, they had the forethought to start bolting my door until they arose.

Somehow I broke out.  I don’t know what my fascination with fire was, but there I was, opening all the drawers in the lower kitchen cabinets to make a ladder to climb up to the cupboards over the sink where they hid the matches (they were both smokers, as it was too common in those days). 

Found the matches, got a plate, and headed back to the sofa.  Don’t ask me why, since it wasn’t my birthday, but there I was lighting the candles on the plate and jumping up and down on the sofa quietly singing “Happy Birthday”.  And in those days, everything was 100% pure flammable cotton.  It didn’t take much jumping for the plate to fall onto my pajama bottoms and flame up immediately.  I don’t remember much from here, but the screams brought everyone out.  Dad slapped the flames out with his hands, also getting burned.  My only vivid memory left (or burned into me), was sitting in the passenger seat of the car, with my burned left leg up on a pillow, with a small piece of blacken flesh about the size of a burnt piece of toast, hanging from my leg by a thin blade of flesh.

It was not so much the burned leg that changed my future outcome, it was my parent’s refusal to accept traditional medicine.  The first doctor the folks took me to was of the old world medicine.  He wanted to stitch my lower left leg to the upper leg (like you pull your leg behind).  I’d never be able to use both legs again.  While I might have still gone to Loyola, I would have never been in CREW.  It’s extremely possible I would have never met Terry, and of course, you would not be here to read this.

Luckily, the folks refused  the traditional approach and asked around.  They heard of a new skin transplant operation that was started at the Children’s Orthopedic Hospital in downtown Los Angeles.  Nine months later (most of it on my stomach), I had a leg to stand on.

Due to the next incident, I don’t have very many memories of the early years.  I was active, but no broken bones or strange illnesses, yet.

Chapter 3: The Teen Years

You could say my brother Mike is the one to thank for the following.

In these days, it was very common for the male teenager to work in gas stations, so Mike started his first job at a local gas station.  Due to the owner cussing Mike out in front of a customer (another negative turn), Mike ended up at Ron and Wayne’s Mobil in the next town – a bit of a drive in those days.

Up to this point, my financial freedom had come from whatever jobs I could find.  From selling seeds door to door, paper routes, and of course, the most common, mowing lawns and gardening.

When Ron found out Mike had a younger brother that needed work, I became Ron’s gardener on weekends.  Ron was so thrilled with my hard work that when I turned 16, he hired me at the same gas station (pay now increased from 75 cents an hour to $1.25).  Ron turned out to be a great person and friend, so I commuted the extra distance every day (8 hours after school) and worked my way up the grease ladder.  A few years later, Ron hired Chris Fay, soon to become one of my closest friends.  And remember, Chris and I live in different towns and went to different schools (and rival schools as well).

For my senior year in High School, I had to take one science class to graduate.  It was Physics or Air Force ROTC (I don’t know how that qualified as a science class).  I was not interested in Physics at the time, so the only other option was ROTC.

I did so well at ROTC that I ended up receiving a 4 year scholarship to any college.  I wanted to stay local, so the only local colleges with ROTC were UCLA and Loyola.  I was undecided which college to go to.  UCLA had the big college name and Loyola was unheard of.  I had until August to decide.  I was leaning towards UCLA.

A little regression here to set the stage.  The folks were not too happy when Mike bought his first low cost transportation (motorcycle).  That paved the road for getting my motorcycle (thanks to all those weekends pulling weeds), which was also my only means of transportation.

Chris was 2 years older than I and also an avid motorcycle rider.  Consequently Chris and I hit it off from the start and did a lot of biking together.  Chris already had his career goal in sight and was spending every penny on it.  Chris wanted to be a pilot.  Chris also wanted a flying buddy and talked me into taking a trial flight at the local airport (not too far away in Fullerton).  So guess how I spent my money during the summer after high school?

One flight was all it took.  It was like I was born to fly.  Show me a new maneuver once and I had it mastered.  While everyone else was soloing in 20 hours, I broke the local record in 10 hours.  And that was due mainly to having the best instructor (Roy) at the flight school. 

By August, with only 20 hours under my wing, I had learned almost every emergency maneuver.  All but one.  On my first cross country flight (from Fullerton to San Diego to Lake Elsinore and back), Roy asked to take over after we passed over Lake Elsinore and started flying above the mountains.  The short version is that Roy descended, made a right turn up a blind canyon, tried to turn out, and we crashed at a 90 degree angle to the slope.  Roy died instantly.  I survived with 100% amnesia for several days.  I was rescued as I tried to crawl out of the canyon.  This negative turn in life (we would have been safe if Roy made a left turn) would be the driving force in changing my destiny many, many times.

Since I was laid up in the hospital for a couple of weeks, and not really able to do much afterwards (on crutches), I didn’t even realize that August had ended.  I applied to both colleges, but only received the freshman package from Loyola.  In my condition, I just went with what was in front of me.  And of course, if I had gone to UCLA, my entire future would be different and you wouldn’t be reading this.  All thanks to the plane crash.

Chapter 4: College Bound

So off to Loyola I go.  Into the freshmen dorms, and unfortunately, on the 3rd floor (no elevators).  Your roommate is whoever just happens to walk in the door.  My first roommate (there’s a clue) Louis Gray was also on a 4 year scholarship, but for the basketball team.  Louis had two problems.  His ego felt he shouldn’t have to live in the oldest dorm on campus.  He moved out within 2 weeks.  His second problem was academics.  We didn’t see Louis after the first year.  If Louis hadn’t left, you wouldn’t be reading this.

Enter my next and final roommate, Joe Fitzpatrick.  Meeting Joe would become a pivotal point in my future (and yours).

Joe was accepted to Loyola late and was on the waiting list for a room.  Joe was majoring in medicine and I in mathematics – two opposite sides of the campus.  Our paths would not have crossed if Joe had lived elsewhere.  Joe was one of the two main ingredients that brought Terry and I together.  The other ingredient was Terry’s older sister Patty.

Also, the only reason I tried out for Crew, was due to the plane crash.  It seemed like an interesting and unique sport, but I joined strictly to build my legs back.  At that time, there was no women’s crew.  Patty was in the women’s auxiliary group “Shell and Oar”.  While I did meet Patty, it was not nearly as close a relationship as with Joe.  And of course, I would associate with everyone else in the Crew program, some of which would have an effect on my destiny.  Again, going into Crew was all due to the plane crash.

Joe ended up dating Patty in our junior year, and they married after graduation.  Patty and Joe set Terry and I across from each other in the wedding party (no one remembers why, fate I guess).  Terry remembers meeting me once at our apartment on campus, but I don’t, so our first real meeting was at the wedding and reception at the Soukup house.

Terry was heart broken that her older sister was not only getting married, but moving to Boston (Joe had a job offer).  That left me with plenty of shoulders for Terry to cry on.  Which led to a nice quiet walk around the area alone to get acquainted.  Terry didn’t mind being alone with me, but her boyfriend did.  He went looking for us and who knows what would have happened if he found us.  You would think that this could have been the end of this tale.  There are still a few possibilities that might have kept Terry and I from getting married that aren’t quite so obvious.

Here are all the possibilities and coincidences that kept our destiny on track.

During my senior year, a Crew friend and biking buddy, Doug Hunter asked me to go with him on a trip around the US on our bikes after graduation.  I would have never had thought about a trip like this.  At this exact point in time, all of the ROTC cadets (Doug was also a cadet) that were guaranteed flight school were surprised to hear the following.

Because the Vietnam War had just ended (within weeks), pilots were no longer dying and the Air Force didn’t need any more pilots.  The Air Force offered the cadets the same four year enlistment doing anything but flying or to wait who knows how long until there were some open pilot slots.  We’re going to chalk this turn in my life to the war ending, which is a good thing for once.  Had the war not ended, I would have gone straight into pilot’s school (out of state) and would most probably not have dated Terry.  I think I would still have met her, but that would have been a weekend off from pilots training.

Time to regress again.  Remember the only reason I was even at Loyola was the ROTC scholarship instead of taking Physics?  My major was originally mathematics.  Math came too easy for me, so it was the logical major.  During my freshman year, I read a short paragraph about Physics and instantly knew this is what I wanted to learn.  I changed majors in the middle of my freshman year.

Having a degree in Physics and becoming an Air Force pilot was the perfect mix for the career I really wanted – to be an astronaut.  I figured this was my destiny.  BEEP!

Only one negative stood in my way – the plane crash.  During my sophomore year I had to pass the flight physical.  The doctor in Torrance that gave the flight physicals was also a pilot.  I sheepishly told him about my crash and my only limitation was not a full extension of moving my ankles, but full enough to use.  I did not tell him about the crack in my skull since I knew that was an immediate disqualification.  It worked.  He passed me.

So now I’m graduating with a degree in Physics, I had already obtained my private pilots license, and have time to spare while waiting for a pilots slot to open up.  And time to date Terry.  So I accept Doug’s offer to bike around the states.  For the last couple of weeks before graduation Doug and I are talking this trip up and I’m pretty excited about it.  All the places to go and things to see before we start our career paths.  The only problem is Doug gets a job offer he can’t turn down and cancels at the last second.

I on the other hand, have time to spare, so I go alone.  I’m gone for three months touring and seeing everything I wanted to see and more.  I send a few postcards to Terry to let her know I want to see her when I get back.  Terry does wait and drops her boyfriend in the process.

A year and a half goes by before the Air Force calls, but not with the pilot slot I had been waiting for.  The Air Force gives me two choices.  Go in for 4 years doing anything but flying or go in for 90 days doing anything but flying.  Get in or get out.  This was not an easy decision.  Could I somehow still get a pilots slot doing nothing?  Do I get out and give up any chance of becoming an astronaut?  I talked this up with everyone that could give me an informed decision for weeks.  I take the 90 days at March Air Force Base in southern California (to be as close as I can be to Terry).

At this point, since my shot at being an astronaut is out the window, I figure why even serve 90 days.  I send the X-rays of the crack in my head to the Air Force and ask for a medical discharge.  I was denied.

I put my request in to be a teacher.  I figure that I could use the 90 days to see if I wanted to teach, something I thought I might want as a career if I couldn’t be an astronaut.  But destiny would again steer me in a different direction.

Another ROTC lieutenant had arrived the day before me.  This other lieutenant had requested a position the Executive Officer (a general’s gopher) – the only other open slot.  The commander of the 54th Air Refueling Wing, General Jim Wade, instantly did not like the other lieutenant and gave him my teacher’s slot.

When I arrived, the General gave me the look over and a short interview.  My only credentials were my trip around the states.  That was enough to become the new Executive Officer.  Thanks to Doug for getting me excited about biking around the states.

Over the next 90 days I did prove my value to the general and his staff.  The general was so impressed that he kept offering me a navigator’s slot.  I told him I was a pilot, not a navigator.  He made me this offer at least a dozen times.  And my reply was the same.

And then the big surprise.  During my last week, the general told me he had opened up a pilot slot for me.  I couldn’t believe it.  Not in my wildest dreams did I think I had a shot for getting back on the path to my dream career.  The general said all I have to do is pass a flight physical.  Destiny did not want me to become a pilot.

Who knows where that turn in life might have taken me?  Maybe that kept me from being on the Challenger (bottom of the ocean).  It’s pretty likely that the marriage proposal to Terry would not have occurred if I went to pilot school.  The marriage proposal would not occur for over another year and I was not ready to settle down at this point in my life.  So again thank the plane crash for keeping me with Terry.

Chapter 5: Life After Loyola

The trip around the states was also responsible for working at Hughes Aircraft Company (to be bought out by Raytheon in 2001).  I was told to put everything I’ve ever done on my resume.  You never know what positive cord something strikes.  My first supervisor Wally Yuki hired me strictly on the fact that I biked around the states.  Wally figured I was independent and could take care of myself.  So for all the people from work I’ve known and whatever little turns my life took from there, thank Doug for getting me to bike around the states.

Not the end yet.  There’s still the marriage proposal.  You’ll have to thank alcohol and Aunt Inge.

It was a regular family party for Uncle Larry and Aunt Inge who were in town from Tennessee during Easter.  I had a few drinks before Terry arrived and was in a festive, playful mood.  When Terry arrived, dad asked me to introduce Terry to Larry and Inge.  In my jovial manner I introduced Terry to Inge as my future bride.  Inge shatters the sound barrier with “Jerry’s getting married!”.  Now you can say the rest is history.

As for your lineage starting.  Terry wanted six children and I wanted zero.  Five years later, twas the night before Christmas in one of those endearing moments that either Donald would be born or no one would.  Terry and I did not want an only child, so Michael was the accomplishment a little over 2 years later.  We thought that was the end, but Kevin surprised us 2 years later.  With 3 boys under her belt (literally), Terry had all but given up on have her little girl.  And of course, that is now history.

So for the most part, the plane crash is why you even exist to read this book.  And that started with someone insulting my brother!