‘We Were Frantic . . . ‘ : Families Concealed Tears, Terror in Hijack Ordeal

Nora Grossmayer, 21, was getting ready for her teaching job when she heard the news on the radio. It was 7:20 a.m.

By 9 a.m., the Grossmayer family--17 in all--had gathered in the green frame house on a quiet street in Algonquin, Ill. The radio and television news were blaring in concert, the phone was ringing, reporters and neighbors were banging at the door.

Only Mom and Dad--Elaine and Simon--were missing. Their airliner had been hijacked and they were now hostages 6,400 miles away.

Day One.

That’s how the ordeal began in hostage homes across America. It was not to be the worst day.

For 16 days, while their loved ones were captives, families from California to Illinois to Massachusetts were held hostage, too. Ordinary people trying to live with the extraordinary, they tried to make sense of an international drama that ensnared their loved ones.

The country saw them as strong, courageous people, and they were. They were also proud people who hid their private terror and tears from the cameras, and often from each other.

In extensive interviews with The Times, families of some of the 39 hostages chronicled horror, humanity and, finally, joy. They described a time when anniversary parties were postponed, Father’s Day was suspended and life was put on hold.

Day One--June 14--was the day time stopped.

Francis Elliott was driving to a business appointment in South Chicago when he heard the news.

“I thought I’d better stop,” he said. “I didn’t think it could be him, but you never know.”

He called home and learned that his son, Grant, 27, returning that day from a church pilgrimage to the Middle East, was on the hijacked plane.

Elliott headed back to the sprawling family home on the flatlands outside Marengo, Ill. Grant’s older sisters and their families arrived a short time later. In the days ahead, they slept, when they could sleep, in sleeping bags in front of the television set.

Day One melded into Day Two. America learned that one of the hostages had been killed.

The Elliotts, in Illinois, watched the clock tick toward 4 a.m., the hour the hijackers said they would blow up the plane.

“We were frantic, trying to call the State Department, the White House, anyone we could,” said Francis Elliott.

First Breakdown

In Algonquin, where the Grossmayers’ five children and their spouses had stayed up all night, the State Department called to say that Simon was among several passengers with Jewish-sounding names who may have been taken off the plane during a stop in Beirut.

Deborah, 26 and pregnant, took the call. She froze, saying nothing, and began to cry.

“We cracked,” said Nora. “That was the first and last time that we all broke down.

“We all calmed down eventually,” she added. “My brother said they didn’t have confirmation. They were speculating again.”

In Algiers, Lorraine Anderson, of Fox River Grove, Ill., was allowed off the plane. Her first thought was: “Freedom.” Then, “Loneliness.” Kenneth, her husband of 37 years, was still a hostage.

In rural upstate New York, Ann Bentley was breaking the news to 80-year-old Mildred Testrake, ailing mother of the plane’s captain, John L. Testrake.

“Breakfast was over,” Bentley recalled. “She was out in the yard. I said we had news that John’s plane had been detained. She turned right around and said, ‘It’s not surprising. There have been so many hijackings.’ ”

On Day 3, Francis Elliott postponed Father’s Day festivities at his Marengo, Ill., home until his son could be present.

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Tension Mounts

From Day 4 to Day 7, the tension mounted.

“I never have nightmares,” said Susan Traugott, sister-in-law of hostage Ralf Traugott, from Lunenburg, Mass.

A week after the hostage crisis began, she had one. She dreamed she was one of the hostages “and they were putting us back on the plane again. The whole dream was absolutely terrifying.”

At first, the family of hostage Thomas W. Murry, of Newbury Park, Calif., expected a “disastrous finish,” his daughter, Marianne Robertson, said. “At that point, we were saying ‘no comment’ to the press.”

On the seventh day, the hijackers staged a news conference. For most of the families, it was less than encouraging. But Ron Conwell, in Houston, relaxed a bit. His brother, Allyn, was spokesman for the hostages. At least he was still alive.

First High Point

Day 7 marked the first high point at the Grossmayer home. Although her husband, Simon, was still a hostage, Elaine Grossmayer returned. She had called one night from Paris, knowing it was 2 a.m. in the Midwest, fearing she would wake the grandchildren, but just wanting to call and say hello.

When Lorraine Anderson returned from Paris without her husband, she saw a yellow ribbon tied around a wishing well in their front yard. “Even with my daughter and children there, the house felt empty. When your husband is gone, it’s an empty house,” she said.

During the second week, Day 8 through Day 13, fear of imminent loss was replaced by tedium.

In Marengo, Ill., Shirley Elliott, Grant’s mother, went to her encyclopedia to learn something about the Middle East. “But the books were 25 years old and all the maps were wrong,” she said.

In Massachusetts, hostage Ralf Traugott’s brother Steve, a lottery enthusiast, designed a game called “hostage bingo,” in which the family played numbers such as 847 (the flight number) and 614 (the date of the hijacking) in the state lottery.

“When the world is crazy around you, you need to do something a little crazy yourself,” explained another brother, Axel.

Life changed for others, too. The wife of Kurt Carlson, a hostage from Rockford, Ill., became a born-again Christian. “She wanted the strength to handle this,” said Kurt’s mother, Via.

The media attention became overpowering for Lorraine Anderson, back from her hostage ordeal but with her husband still at risk. Suddenly, everyone knew her. A quick trip to the store took hours. “Everyone wanted to talk,” she said. She began shopping at stores 30 miles away, leaving her answering machine on.

The letters started arriving at Jo Anne Lazansky’s Algonquin home during the second week, filling the mailbox beneath the wreath of yellow ribbons and American flag. “Half of them are from people I don’t even know,” said the wife of hostage George Lazansky, who had been a hostage the first day herself. “I never knew I had so many friends.”

Thomas Murry’s family in California conferred and decided to meet with the media after all--but only outside the house, in the yard.

On the 14th day, a news blackout at the White House seemed to be a sign of progress. Secretary of State George P. Shultz said the United States wanted “all 46” hostages released--the first time the Administration had linked the plight of seven Americans abducted over the last 16 months in Lebanon with the TWA hostages.

In Joliet, Ill., the family of Roman Catholic priest Lawrence Jenco marked Day 171 of the priest’s captivity with hope. The TWA hijacking had “reopened old wounds,” said the priest’s sister, Sue Franceschini, but Shultz’s remarks gave them hope again that Father Jenco would be released.

Hostage Kenneth Anderson was one of those who appeared on television on Day 14. “That looks like a Hawaiian shirt he’s wearing,” said his son-in-law.

“That’s my red-and-white blouse!” said Anderson’s wife. She learned later that her husband had mistakenly picked out her suitcase instead of his own.

Day 15 saw the beginning of the hostages’ phone calls home.

In Marengo, Ill., the ringing phone stopped Francis and Shirley Elliott as they were heading out the door for their first dinner out in two weeks. It was Grant, calling from a restaurant in Beirut, still captive.

“Well,” said Grant’s familiar voice, “I guess we’re famous.”

Later, his father said: “I’ll remember that as long as I live.”

The Grossmayers, whose hopes had been raised by a false report that their father had been released because of poor health, got a call that cheered them up, too.

“Hi, Nora,” Simon Grossmayer said to his daughter.

“It’s so good to hear your voice,” she said.

That night Nora got another call--from a Vietnam veteran in Wisconsin who had heard of her father’s plight and offered to take his place in Beirut.

“You’ve done enough for our country in your lifetime,” Nora told him.

Kindness of Strangers

The kindness of friends--and strangers--surprised many. In Riley, N.Y., the local cable television company installed service free in the home of Capt. Testrake’s mother so the family could watch the news reports. So many restaurants refused to allow the Grossmayers to pay for meals that they began making reservations in one of the in-laws’ names.

The families in the Chicago area met with President Reagan on Day 15. Most supported his actions in the crisis.

“You have to draw the line against terrorism somewhere,” Nora Grossmayer said.

On Day 16, last Saturday, the Grossmayer family went to bed at 1:30 a.m. The State Department called an hour later, saying the hostages would soon be on the road to Damascus and freedom.

The family began calling relatives. When they couldn’t get hold of an aunt, they laughed hysterically, tension draining from their faces.

“We were laughing over the stupidest things, and no one could get back to sleep,” Nora said.

By nightfall, however, the hostages were still in Beirut.

Lorraine Anderson got her State Department call, and burst into tears of joy for the first time since the crisis began. By day’s end, though, she compared the ordeal to “a horror movie. When it looks like it is over, it just keeps going on.” Still, she packed a bag just in case.

Free at Last

On Day 17, Sunday, the hostage families awoke to renewed news that the captives would soon be free. A banker in Marengo, Ill., opened the bank’s doors so Shirley Elliott could retrieve her birth certificate and get an emergency passport to fly to West Germany to meet her son.

Simon Grossmayer’s wife, Elaine, threw some essential items into a suitcase, including some fresh clothes for her husband and a watch to replace the one taken from him during the hijacking.

In Houston, Ron Conwell and his brother and sister broke open a bottle of champagne as a group of reporters recorded the event.

But in Joliet, Ill., the relatives of Father Jenco got bad news. Jenco and the other six so-called “forgotten hostages” were not among those coming home. The family added a purple ribbon to their yellow ribbons. It hangs in memory of Navy diver Robert Dean Stethem, the one hostage killed by the hijackers.

In California, Day 17 was also the first night Thomas Murry’s family was able to sleep without waiting for a phone call and without television lighting the room, Murry’s daughter, Marianne Robertson, said.

“The word hostage is leaving my vocabulary forever,” she said. “Hopefully.”

Also contributing to this story were Times staff writers Larry Green in Chicago, John J. Goldman in New York, J. Michael Kennedy in Houston, Marlene Cimons in Frankfurt, West Germany, and Herbert A. Sample in Los Angeles.