Moms Muster In for March Against Guns

A million moms versus millions of guns. The odds may be against them, but it’s a valiant effort worth cheering.

They come from myriad lifestyles and interests. But they’ll join together Sunday--Mother’s Day--to march for sensible gun laws. Tens of thousands in the nation’s capital, many thousands more at major cities across the country.

Even if the foot soldiers of the Million Moms March fall short of seven figures, they’ve already brought renewed attention to our need to do something to control the proliferation of guns in this country.

Through their common cause they’ve forged new friendships. It’s tied them together to take them to the next step, the November elections.

But that’s months away, and for now, their concentration is on a good pair of shoes for walking.

This week I had the chance to talk with five of them. They’ve never marched before. But this issue compelled them to act.

There’s Sherry Fortelny of Huntington Beach, Orange County’s coordinator, who recalls that a few months back “it was pretty lonely; we didn’t have a lot of moms signed up.”

But in recent weeks, she said, interest has mushroomed. She’s busy some days round the clock just trying to organize Orange County’s end of it.

She goes to bed dead tired, but finds sleep difficult, for a couple of reasons. Orange County has its gun lovers, of course, and her involvement in the Million Moms March has led to something she never dreamed would be part of her life--death threats.

But more disturbing to her are the stories she’s learned from the women she’s met. A mother whose daughter killed herself with a gun. Another whose son shot the baby-sitter by accident. A woman whose son was gunned down.

Jo Ann Morrison of Huntington Beach has one of those stories herself.

Remember the news last year when a sniper began firing at random at vehicles off Interstate 80 between Reno and Lake Tahoe? Her son John, then 27, was one of the victims. Though he is active again, a bullet remains lodged near his heart. Dealing with that trauma has led Morrison to believe she can’t sit on the sidelines on this one.

Sensible Gun Laws

“I’m not an extremist,” Morrison said. “But sensible gun laws make sense to me.”

Lillian French, the principal at Davis Elementary School in Santa Ana, said she wanted to join the march the first time she heard about it.

“I missed the ‘60s,” she said. “This to me is a once in a lifetime experience.”

French has witnessed a dramatic improvement in her school’s neighborhood because of its community policing program.

“It made me see what grass-roots support can accomplish,” she said. “That’s what we’ll show in Washington, that there is grass-roots support for doing something about gun laws.”

Linda Ellsworth Gleich of San Clemente didn’t know anything about the Mother’s Day march until she read about it in this column a few months back. But as the mother of a teen daughter, she was rocked by the student massacre at Columbine High in Colorado last year, and numerous other school shootings.

She saw this march as a way to get involved. When she told her husband, Bill Gleich, his reaction was: “Are husbands allowed too?”

Now they’ll go to Washington together.

Soon after the Columbine massacre, students were evacuated at Travis Ranch Elementary School in Yorba Linda because of a bomb threat. Donna Harises had a son at that school.

“It made me think, no school is safe anywhere,” she said, “until we can do something to keep assault weapons out of people’s hands.”

Harises can’t make it to Washington. So she’ll join the thousands expected to march in Los Angeles on Olivera Street. And she’s bringing lots of friends.

“I talked about it at a Monday Bible group at my church [First Christian Church of Orange],” she explained. “Some of the others said they wanted to do something too.”

Now a whole church van will be headed to Los Angeles to make a statement about guns.

For Fortelny, Sunday will mean a chance to meet many mothers she’s become friends with through e-mail. They’re now more than friends. They are a network of advocates who will stay together to make their voices heard in the November elections.

“All this work is finally paying off,” Fortelny said.

On Sunday, Fortelny will be wearing ribbons with the names of children killed by gun violence, children of the women she’s gotten to know through this endeavor.

She’ll leave the ribbons at the mall, her own memorial to them.

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Jerry Hicks’ column appears Monday and Thursday. Readers may reach Hicks at (714) 966-7789 or jerry.hicks@latimes.com.