2008 Woodie Awards
Flying High with Dr. Kathy Rath-Marr
Jennifer Jelenic
Issue date: 10/21/04 Section: Features
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Upon entering Marr's office for the first time, I was immediately overwhelmed by the amount of books stacked everywhere. The books were pouring from the wall shelves, stacked on the floor, on her desk, and of course, on the chair I was offered to sit in. Marr has an infectious energy around her, some of which she must dedicate to skimming, reading, and collecting books that interest her.
The remainder of that energy is spent on awesome adventures that most people only dream of. For example, Marr spends an evening each week with her youngest of four children learning the art of fencing. She told me her son jokingly calls the sport "poke your mom." For the last two and a half years, this mother-son team has also taken up horseback riding. Marr has now been urged by her instructor to participate in a Saturday morning competition because she is ready to advance to the next level of equestrian life.
Speaking of riding, Marr is an accomplished motorcyclist. I asked her to confirm the rumor about taking her bike across campus during the summer. "Well, both North and South Drive were torn up to the point of only being dust and gravel," which anyone who rides knows is dangerous terrain for motorcycles, "so I took my bike slowly through the middle of campus." As a child, Marr grew up riding her tricycle around the Lakeland campus, so if anyone is qualified to drive a bike through it, it is Kathy Marr.
Marr went on to tell me about a motorcycle trip that she, her husband, and son made to Hell and back-literally. They planned a ride to Hell, Michigan, just to say that they had been there, and luckily returned. That trip was almost cut short when the thought of riding her motorcycle over a plank bridge intimidated her, but she did not let the bridge thwart her goal of going to Hell.
Honestly, I am under the impression that all things in life tend to inspire Kathy Marr. She confessed to being a glass-is-half-full kind of person, and added "every day that I have lost over the years I'm taking back." That is where the bi-plane adventure comes in. Marr decided to go flying early one morning to celebrate the first fifty years of her life. She has some flight hours logged already, and thought it would be a fun way to spend her birthday. The plane she flew that day was a vintage, single engine, 1929 travel air bi-plane, operated by the EAA out of Oshkosh.
The pilot was an experienced flyer who gave Marr the choice of flight plan for the day. The choices were along the lakeshore, over beautiful Wisconsin farm land, or they could perform maneuvers. According to Kathy Marr, "life begins at fifty," and so she chose maneuvers. The pilot got the plane safely in the air and let Marr get used to the feel of it, and then he went straight up. There is a point, as I am sure you can imagine, when an aircraft can not go straight up anymore and the engine will actually starve itself of fuel, therefore stalling. The plane will then begin to descend, tail first, rapidly, toward the earth.
That is exactly what happened on Marr's birthday flight. The pilot reported over the ICS (headsets) 90 knots, 80 knots, 70 knots, ok I'm going to start the engine now. As I listen to this story I am reminded of my first demonstration of 'stall speed', and how I was taught to avoid that situation at all costs. What a rush that must have been, to know you are in a very old airplane, without the engine running, headed straight for the ground backwards. Marr said she would do it again, and added that she still considers getting a pilot's license. "It's a good life, enjoy every minute because it goes by so fast."