Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, July 30, 1994 TAG: 9408010045
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By DAN CASEY STAFF WRITER NOTE: below
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
A year ago, Morgan ended a troubled marriage, her second. In September, she was about to embark on another life chapter. She and her fiance, William "Chris" Kidd Jr., would be married on her mother's 76th birthday in an old castle near the town in Germany where she was born.
"She was extremely happy and finally at peace with herself after a decade of turmoil. Chris made her so happy," recalls Michelle Dalton, Morgan's elder daughter. "Three weeks ago, she told me, `Things are going so well, it's scary.'''
Those dreams came to a crashing halt Sunday morning on a rural highway in south-central Ohio's lazy cornfields.
Just after 9 a.m., an oncoming pickup truck careened in front of Morgan's sports coupe and struck it head-on. Morgan, driving, was killed. Kidd, in the passenger seat, suffered only a scratch.
Matthew A. Schultz, the 27-year-old driver of the truck, faces driving-under-the-influence and other traffic charges. Police in Ohio are awaiting results of drug and alcohol tests, and he could be charged with vehicular homicide. Schultz has one previous drunken-driving conviction.
This week, Morgan's family gathered in Roanoke, with equal parts sadness and anger, as hundreds of friends and acquaintances whose lives she had touched flocked to her funeral.
The terms they use in describing her have common themes: vibrant; honest to a fault; driven to succeed; devoted to her family; fanatically neat; "classy," even when digging through her flower beds.
Above all, she was caring of others, they say.
"She was so considerate, very kind. Everybody just brought their problems to her," recalls Anne Huffman, Morgan's real estate partner with Boone and Co. Huffman says she couldn't count the number of times Morgan would hole up in a company conference room with co-workers, listening to their troubles.
Morgan would go out of her way to help needy families, especially around Christmas. Her daughter Angela recalls her buying stacks of coloring books and sacks of crayons and handing them out to children.
On another occasion, Michelle says, Morgan loaded her vehicle with clothing and gifts and delivered them to a financially struggling family of nine she didn't even know.
Morgan's life probably helped her develop that empathy. It was rarely easy.
The eldest of four children, she was born into war-torn Germany and was barely 5 when World War II ended.
Food was scarce. As a young girl, Morgan helped her father scavenge potato peelings and other scraps from garbage bins amid the bombed ruins of Hamburg, says Gabriele Balke-Koch, her younger sister.
When her family sent her out to buy milk, the hungry girl used to sneak a few sips on the way home, then fill the bottle up with water.
"She used to joke that she'd invented 2 percent milk," said Steve Sumner, husband of Morgan's younger daughter, Angela.
Morgan was 16 when she graduated from high school. Shortly afterward, she got a job as a clerk at a gas station on a U.S. Army base.
Within a few years, she was running the place. The military newspaper Stars and Stripes published a feature story on her, calling her the first-ever female manager of a U.S. military fueling station. An attractive blond, she also did some fashion modeling on the side.
At the base, she met and married Donald W. Moore, a U.S. civilian Army employee. They had two daughters, Michelle and Angela, before Moore accepted a job with the U.S. Postal Service. He moved the family to Tidewater in 1972, then to Botetourt County in 1977. She became a U.S. citizen.
The couple divorced in 1980. Morgan, who had worked as a grocery store bookkeeper and office manager for Century 21 real estate, got her agent's license that year. Suddenly she was the family breadwinner, and she went at selling homes with gusto.
"She put a sign on her refrigerator: 'This is my goal, to sell $1 million in real estate,' because she was raising the kids," Kidd said.
In just a few years, Morgan's business was growing. She teamed up with Huffman, and the pair called themselves the "dynamic duo." Others thought so, too.
In 1985, Len Boone and Tim Garrison recruited them away from Century 21. But it wasn't the typical jump of agents from one broker to another. Morgan, who still lived in Botetourt, was reluctant to work in Roanoke each day because her children still lived at home.
"Len Boone came to them. He took them to a piece of property on [U.S.] 460 and told them, `if you come to work for us, we'll buy this land and build an office for you.''' Kidd said.
They agreed, and Boone followed through. The result was "a perfect union," Kidd said.
Her second marriage, to Roy Morgan in 1983, was less successful. Michelle and Angela say their mother struggled through it unhappily before leaving him in 1992, a split that relieved both daughters. Their divorce was granted last year.
Morgan and Kidd, who'd worked together at Boone and Co. since 1989, began dating shortly after the breakup and had been inseparable ever since. In September, they became engaged. Both daughters say they hadn't seen their mother so happy in years.
Kidd rides a motorcycle; Morgan learned how. She began painting lightning bolts on her helmet for each thunderstorm she'd ridden through - like notches on a gunslinger's pistol grip.
In the months since the engagement, the couple had planned their future. One of Morgan's passions was arranging dried flowers; Kidd collected antiques. Together, they would open a country-style store selling both on Red Rake Ranch, his 21/2-acre homestead on Virginia 24 near Stewartsville.
Morgan sold her own house and moved into Kidd's. This year, they put a large addition onto it. Her family gathered at the immaculate home after the funeral Wednesday.
Eerily, Morgan seemed to have a premonition recently that something bad was about to happen. Huffman said she spoke with Morgan just before Morgan and Kidd left for Ohio on July 20. Morgan was busy cleaning her house; Huffman asked her why.
"She said, `You know, Annie girl, I've got to make sure my house is clean, because you never know what's going to happen.'''
And a man Morgan knew approached the family at the funeral and related a conversation he'd had with her just two weeks ago.
"He was getting ready to go on a trip. He was driving a long way," Angela Sumner said. "She said, `You be careful, because there are a lot of crazy people out there.'''
Keywords:
FATALITY
by CNB