Father of tornado victim recalls family

By Mike Pound
THE JOPLIN GLOBE (JOPLIN, Mo.)

JOPLIN, Mo. May 12, 2008 08:29 pm

— Jim Rountree told me he wasn’t soliciting a story. He said he was just a dad who wanted folks to remember his son and his family.
“They were such good people,” Jim said. “They were so active in the community.”
Richard Rountree, his wife, Kathy, their son, Clayton, and Kathy’s mother, Ruby Bilke, were killed in Saturday’s devastating tornado that blew through the area. The family members were traveling to a wedding when their car was lifted off the road near Highway 43 and Iris Road. So far, the storm has claimed more than 20 lives.
Jim said Richard was supposed to sing at the wedding. He said his son loved to sing and recently served as the interim music director at Forest Park Baptist Church in Joplin.
“He really enjoyed sharing his music,” Jim said.
Jim lives in San Antonio, Texas. He said he and Richard’s mother were divorced many years ago, but he remained close to his son.
“We see each other at least four or five times a year,” he said, speaking in the present tense.
I didn’t know who Jim was when Andy Ostmeyer, the Globe’s metro editor, asked me to speak with him. Andy told me that Jim was related to someone who had been killed in the storm. He said Jim and his wife had come in to buy a few extra copies of Sunday’s and Monday’s newspapers. He asked me to go down and chat with Jim, so I did.
When Jim told me his name, I was immediately uneasy. See, I knew Kathy Rountree quite well. My wife and I used to play volleyball with Kathy. She was a neat woman who, I knew, adored her family. Kathy worked at Joplin Printing Co. when I first met her. Later, she moved on to teach at Franklin Technology Center. I last saw Kathy about a year ago, when she brought a group of students to the Globe.
It’s tough reporting on tragedies, but it’s even tougher when you have a connection with the victims. But that’s the thing about tornadoes: They don’t discriminate. They don’t care who, or what, is in their path.
We hear and read about natural disasters all the time. Most of the time, they don’t register much with us. But then something like this happens. Something essentially drops out of the sky and, in the blink of an eye, changes lives forever. Then, all of a sudden, we’re connected. All of a sudden, we realize that anyone could have been in the path of that storm. We realize that we could have been driving with our family along Highway 43 when that storm hit. We realize how lucky we are. And we wonder why others weren’t so lucky. We wonder why a caring, loving family on the way to what was to have been a joyous occasion was taken. We also realize that it probably doesn’t do any good to wonder. But we do it anyway.
Jim told me that he saw a television report Saturday night in San Antonio about the tornado that killed Richard, Kathy Clayton and Ruby.
“They mentioned Seneca, and I don’t know anyone in Seneca, so I didn’t give it much thought,” he said.
Then, at 5 a.m. Sunday, he received a call from Larry Bilke, Kathy’s brother, with the news.
“We’re still sort of in shock,” Jim said.
Jim and I talked about his daughter-in-law. I told him that Kathy was a great volleyball player. He smiled and said that Kathy loved sports. I also told him that Kathy was a great person. He smiled again.
Since I’m a newspaper reporter, I probably was supposed to interview Jim, but my heart really wasn’t in it. I hate it when reporters ask people how they feel at a time when they know exactly how those people feel. So I didn’t really interview Jim. Mainly we just talked.
He told me that his son worked at Joplin Supply Co. for years. He gave me the names of a lot of people who could tell me about his son.
Jim talked about his grandson, Clayton. He also told me about his granddaughter, Kelli — Richard and Kathy’s oldest daughter — who was not with the family Saturday afternoon. She’s engaged to be married, Jim said. He shook his head while he talked about her. She’s lost everyone, he said.
Jim told me he didn’t know when funeral services would be scheduled. He said relatives were to meet later Monday with officials from the funeral home.
After a while, Jim and I were through talking. I thanked him for talking to me. He thanked me for talking to him. Then Jim and his wife left the Globe carrying their newspapers.
No, Jim was not soliciting a news story Monday afternoon. He was just a dad who wanted people to know that his son and his family were good people.
And now they do.

Mike Pound writes for The Joplin (Mo.) Globe.

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