ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, January 21, 1997 TAG: 9701210117
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BETTY HAYDEN SNIDER STAFF WRITER
PATRICIA LEFTWICH spoke to the assembled crowd about her four children and her mother, asking them to remember the people they were, not just how they died.
The house at 1228 Stewart Ave. S.E. has been boarded up since a fire killed four children and their grandmother one year ago Monday.
Monday night, Patricia Leftwich, the children's mother, returned to the house and her Roanoke neighbors for a candlelight memorial service.
It was an eerie scene on a night almost as cold as the night of the fire, but much calmer.
Family portraits were hung on the plywood nailed over the front porch windows. On each wrought-iron pillar was a poster with a child's picture and name stenciled around it.
A remnant of the yellow police tape that surrounded the house was tied to one pillar.
Leftwich took a deep breath as she stood before almost 50 friends, relatives and former neighbors. Some sat in folding chairs that Oakey Funeral Service set up on the tiny front yard; others lined the sidewalk.
"For me, this is part of closing," Leftwich said to those gathered, who included the children's father, Mark Leftwich.
She asked people not to remember her loved ones because they died in a fire, but for the individuals they were.
Mark, 6, would have grown up to be a firefighter or a paramedic, she said. He was the man of the house who made the others behave.
Clyde, 5, had a crush on his school bus driver, Judy. He always made his mom laugh.
Patrick, 4, always had a pacifier in his mouth and ran around outside with only a diaper on because he hated clothes, Patricia Leftwich said.
Nancy, 3, let her brothers make her a tomboy, but she was still a little girl with Shirley Temple curls.
Leftwich's mother, Goldie Christine Duncan, was 46 when she died.
"Her last breath was drawn at this window," Leftwich said, pointing to the second floor. "She wanted to make sure those kids got out before she did. She was my best friend."
Before the ceremony, she said complete closure won't come until the house is torn down. The house, which Leftwich rented, now belongs to her after settlement of a wrongful-death lawsuit she filed against the owners.
Since the fire, the city has adopted a rental inspection program in an effort to improve the condition of rental housing in Roanoke.
Rocky Lang, Mark Leftwich's brother, was the first person to arrive at the memorial service Monday night. He sat on the front steps smoking a cigarette with a sad expression on his face.
He lives about four blocks away, and the children used to spend a lot of time at his house, he said. They would often follow him down to the store to get candy.
"They were just like any other kids, always into mischief," Lang said with a slight smile. The hardest part of the last year has been "just accepting that they're gone."
Sue Shelton, who lives in the 1300 block of Stewart, brought her 10-year-old daughter, Rose, and her 2-year-old son, Steven. Rose used to see the Leftwich children at church.
"When I think of that night, it still brings back a lot of memories," Shelton said. "It could have been us."
Shelton's sentiment probably was shared by many in the crowd, who held their children or stood close to them as Patricia Leftwich talked about why she believes she was spared:
"I was left here for one reason, and that's to make sure that no one else goes through what I went through."
LENGTH: Medium: 75 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: DON PETERSEN STAFF. Surrounded by friends and relatives,by CNBPatricia Leftwich leads a candlelight memorial service in front of
the house where her four children and mother died in a fire one year
ago Monday night. color.