#INTHEAIREVERYWHERE
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#INTHEAIREVERYWHERE |
| Vol. 17 No. 45 | Friday
July 27, 2018 |
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Forever Cary |
While out walking the dog recently, I looked up and noted white smoke lettering scrawled across the sky, spelling out the word Geico. I knew right away that Skytypers were hard at work, as they have been for years during summer. Skytypers owner Morty Arkin was based in the Marine Air Terminal, where Air Cargo News held offices for nearly a quarter of the 20th century. We were good friends along with Tim Peirce, the LaGuardia Airport manager who found a place at the field for people like us and Doc Herrlin, the neighborhood kid who grew up and went into the medical arts, practicing at the airport because, like all of us, he loved the place. Now Tim and Morty and John Herrlin are gone. Last week we learned the First Lady of LaGuardia Airport for more than 20 years, Cary Peirce, unexpectedly died on June 26, 2018. Cary was great. Her contagious sense of humor and quick wit was always like a breath of fresh air in an era of smoked-filled rooms. I first met Cary up in Fairfield, where Tim and Cary lived with their two daughters, Amanda and Jennifer. The home was warm and all country, with a barn where the Peirce’s kept their Model A Ford pickup truck, and a pasture out back big enough to land a private airplane. We had all trudged to Fairfield to celebrate one thing or another going on at LaGuardia Airport, and I recall Cary that day was having none of it. None of it with the boys, that is. Cary obviously had worked hard setting up the food and drinks and had opened up the house, surrendering the place to us. I always loved that home in Fairfield because, among other things, it was the living proof of a cartoon by James Thurber called “House & Woman.” The moment you entered the front door, the place just simply wrapped itself around you with the spirit of Cary. For that LaGuardia Airport manager’s day in Fairfield, she spent the entire day with the wives and girlfriends, making it clear that her agenda was advancing the conversation about women, but we all felt that she was with us right in the middle of things. At the end of the party, Cary gave Sabiha three different kinds of mint from the Peirce garden, explaining their best usage. Today, nearly 40 years later, that mint still appears yearly in our garden here at home. Every time the strains of “My Old Kentucky Home” play, marking the start of the Derby, I run outside and pick some of that mint for the juleps, just as Cary instructed, and think of her.
She was gentle and sweet with all of us. But she did not suffer fools and was very firm and dedicated to her agenda, which included the betterment and enrichment of the airport experience and beyond that, the community where she lived, Fairfield, Connecticut. When Tim died in 2000, they held a memorial service for him at the Marine Air Terminal. The memorial took on the trappings of an official Port Authority event, so I quietly asked Cary if I could read the notes I had written for Tim to her personally and she said yes. I recall quoting the John Donne poem that was also the title of the Hemingway book, For Whom The Bell Tolls: “If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend’s or of thine own were: any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.” I handed her the slip of paper with those words and a kiss. She said thanks, gave me a second hug, and walked away. Now, for nearly 18 years since Tim passed, every January our publication recalls something about those golden years at LaGuardia. During that time we have stayed in touch with Cary as we both shared some moments that continue to shine brightly in the rearview mirror. Somebody wrote that Cary has joined her husband, Tim, in heaven, and that without a doubt is true. But we liked it better with Cary down here. I think I’ll go outside and pick some mint. Geoffrey Arend |
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17 No. 42Tariff Dustup Could Be Cargo Windfall Chuckles for July 26, 2018 LHR Vote Needs Positive Action HAPAG Pays Divident Even More Soccer Lufthansa On The Spot Dog Travel In The Air |
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17 No. 43Happy Feet At Farnborough Chuckles for July 19, 2018 Summer In The Air Markets In Quieter Side Of Steady |
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Publisher-Geoffrey
Arend • Managing Editor-Flossie Arend • Film Editor-Ralph Arend • Special Assignments-Sabiha Arend, Emily Arend • Advertising Sales-Judy Miller |
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