The seventies were troubling times for the family. When Joe was 4 and Paul was 8, their parents ended their marriage and went in different directions. Joe and Paul went to Michigan with their mother.

Six months later their father also moved to Michigan. This was a difficult time for everyone. Both parents had started new lives with new partners. Paul and Joe had two sets of parents, two quite different sets of parents-and both loved them very much.

Joe packs his Macintosh for college. He graduated from Washtenaw Community College in Ann Arbor. After completing a two year tour in the Army, to earn money for school, he returned to college. First he tried the University of Florida. Then he want to a small bible college in Ohio and began to study to be a missionary. Neither of these lasted more than a semester. He again tried a secular college and was a student at Northern Kentucky University studying anthropology and working part-time at a local landscape nursery at the time of the accident.

Joe loved to take long walks in the forest and capture the beatuy of nature in photographs. He also loved to read and write. He read many of the great philosophers and writers from every time period and walk of life. He was searching for truth and the meaning of life. Press here to read a paper, Thunderheart, he wrote for a class he was taking. He was quite proud of it and wanted everyone to read it. He called his father the week-end before the accident and asked him to be sure and read it. He said it represented his thinking on life at the time. The last thing he said to his father in that phone conversation was-I love you. I love you, too, Joe.