Lowman Hot Springs Photo By Natalie Bartley
www.idahoseniorindependent.com
TAKE ONE!
FREE!
Muriel Simbro inducted into National Skydiving Museum Hall of Fame By Jack McNeel Last November in Eloy, Arizona, Clark Fork’s Muriel Simbro joined a very select group with her induction into the National Skydiving Museum Hall of Fame located in Vicksburg, Virginia. Though recognition is recent, Muriel’s skydiving history dates to 1960 when she and her husband Hank first started jumping from planes. Perhaps the story should start even earlier, 86 years earlier, when Muriel was born in Santa Monica and eventually graduated from North Hollywood High in 1945. About those early years and her marriage, she says with a laugh, “It’s a story in itself. My husband is my step brother,” which requires a bit of explanation. “We went to church together, not knowing each other. He would sit on one end of the pew and I would sit on the other. His mother had put him in military school and he looked so cute in his uniform. We were both eight years old. I kept looking down the pew at him but he never looked my way.” Muriel’s mother passed away when Muriel was 13. “When we turned 14 my dad fell in love with his (Hank’s) mother.” They married a year later and Muriel’s father adopted Hank. “We fell in love,” she declares. He served 27 months in the Marine Corps and was wounded at Iwo Jima but when he came home they married. That was in May of 1946. Those early married years were a wonderful time. They built a roadster and a hot rod to ride on the desert. They got their pilot’s licenses. And they started a family which was to eventually number three daughters. Muriel explains that the skydiving began shortly before 1960. “We were coming through a canyon in San Fernando and saw these guys jumping out of an airplane. Skydiving was rare at that time. Hank said, ‘We ought to get a parachute and put it in this plane.’ He went to the drop zone to see what was going on and the guy told him he should take a jump to see how he liked it. Hank made his first jump the next weekend. He was so excited!” She was initially a little reluctant to jump. She told him she would take him up so he could jump during the week. “So he did. I dropped him for 40 jumps.” His excitement continued. It was all he could think about and he encouraged her to try it. It wasn’t long until she relented. “They put me in a cargo chute, a 32-footer. Normally they are just 28-feet. I was up there so long I thought they (Continued on page 6) Top Photo - Muriel and her youngest daughter jump together at the Parachute Pioneers in Massachusetts in 2011. Bottom Photo - Muriel with two daughters and a granddaughter who did a tandem jump last fall in Arizona – when she was 85. (Photos provided by Muriel Simbro)