‘I’m Alive,’ Jenco Phones Cheering, Weeping Family

The voice was weak, but the message was strong. “I’m alive,” Father Lawrence Martin Jenco told his family over a scratchy telephone line Saturday.

The call marked the end of the Roman Catholic priest’s 564-day hostage ordeal and nearly 19 months of efforts and prayers by his relatives to win his freedom.

Jenco, kidnaped by Muslim extremists in Beirut on Jan. 8, 1985, called from Damascus, Syria, just minutes after the State Department confirmed that he had been released.

Church bells tolled in celebration throughout this industrial city 40 miles south of Chicago. Jenco’s sister, Sue Franceschini, fainted. A nephew, Andrew Mihelich, popped open champagne. Family members cried. Neighbors cheered.

“We’ve all got our running shoes on, and we’ll be there tomorrow,” Mae Mihelich told her brother as each of the six brothers and sisters took turns speaking briefly with the priest, who had gone to Lebanon to head Catholic Relief Services operations.

“We’ve got at least 45 family members ready to travel,” said Andrew, a college administrator. But only part of the family is flying to Wiesbaden, West Germany, today for a reunion with Jenco, who is 51 and who observed two birthdays in captivity.

“He looks beautiful,” said Joseph Jenco, a brother, as the family watched the first television pictures of the priest. “He has a lot more gray hair now. He looks like Moses.”

A heart ailment and a chronic eye infection had the family concerned, but U.S. officials in Damascus reported Jenco in satisfactory condition.

“It’s been 19 months of hell,” Joseph later said of the long wait.

“Now we can have a real Christmas,” said a sister, Betty Blair. “We’ll decorate all the trees on the lawn.”

‘Off the Roller Coaster’

“We’re off the emotional roller coaster,” said Mae Mihelich, whose small, white frame house has been the nerve center of a well-organized and public campaign by the family to secure freedom for Jenco and other American hostages.

Every Monday night, the family gathered around Mae’s dining room table to map strategy. They decided who would travel to meetings with congressmen and government officials, who would appear on television programs and who would contact news organizations. The clock on the wall over the table was set to Beirut time, and the map on the wall was filled with pins indicating places throughout the world where family members had been to drum up support and to negotiate for Jenco’s release.

To raise money, the family sold T-shirts, bumper stickers and balloons.

“The State Department wanted us to be quiet,” said Joseph Jenco. “They wanted quiet diplomacy. Well, quiet diplomacy wasn’t getting anywhere, so we decided to hit the State Department and to hit them hard. We got more information from the press and from friends than we did from the State Department.

Helping Other Families

“And we’re committed to helping the other hostage families now, State Department or no State Department,” he added.

Jenco asked his nephew, Andrew, to call the families of David P. Jacobsen, 55, of Huntington Beach, Calif., and Thomas Sutherland, 55, and to tell the two hostages’ relatives that the priest had seen them and that they were well. Jacobsen, administrator of the American University Hospital in Beirut, was kidnaped May 28, 1985. Sutherland, dean of the university’s School of Agriculture, was abducted June 9, 1985.

Jenco said he had also seen hostage Terry A. Anderson, 38, chief Middle East correspondent for the Associated Press. He met Anderson’s sister, Peggy Say, when he arrived in Damascus on Saturday.

But Jenco’s release was tempered by a videotape he carried with him. It showed Jacobsen reporting that a fourth hostage, William Buckley, 57, of Medford, Mass., a political officer at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut who was abducted March 16, 1984, had been killed by his captors.

Debriefing Expected

Family members believe that the priest is carrying messages for the families and for the Reagan Administration and expect him to undergo an extensive debriefing by U.S. authorities.

The Jenco family said they were particularly indebted to California Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove), who met with Syrian President Hafez Assad a few weeks ago and assured the family that Jenco would be released in August. Dornan came to the family’s aid after their own congressman, George M. O’Brien, died last month after devoting the final year of his life to working for freedom for the priest.

Dornan said Saturday that he will ask Assad to help obtain the release of the remaining American hostages. When Dornan met with Assad, he presented the Syrian leader with a letter signed by 251 House members asking Assad’s help in freeing the hostages. Dornan said that he was encouraged by Assad’s response and that he will follow up by collecting several dozen more House signatures on a letter to be sent to Assad on Monday.

Better Ties With U.S.

“I think he is really doing a good job of . . . establishing a better relationship with the United States,” Dornan said of the Syrian president. “I am hopeful the other hostages will be released.”

Father Jenco is a member of the Order of Servites of Mary, headquartered in Buena Park, Calif.

Jenco’s unexpected release did not alter plans for the family to help cook 400 hot dogs for a political fund-raiser Saturday for brother Joseph, who is running for the Illinois legislature.

And they still planned to take part in a Joliet festival Saturday night, in which they were to float down the Illinois River on a boat called Freedom and set loose 564 balloons, one for each day of Jenco’s captivity.

And they changed the message on the big billboard on Mae Mihelich’s front lawn, which used to keep track of the days Jenco was held hostage. The new message reads:

“Fr. Martin Jenco American Held Hostage in Lebanon.

“Released July 26, 564 days.

“AMEN.”