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Jessica and me
In October 1987, I had been the Associated Press correspondent in El Paso, Texas, for about three months. My coverage territory was vast: most of Texas west of Abilene, including the Panhandle and Big Bend country; southern New Mexico, and northern Chihahua state in Mexico. Later, it would not be unusual for me to drive six hours to cover a court hearing in Midland, then drive six hours back home that night or the next morning.
One day, as I puttered around in my office, the desk supervisor in my home office in Dallas called to say that a girl had fallen into a well in Odessa. She said I should make some phone calls and find out what was going on. "It's a little girl," my editor said. "The story has a lot of pathos."
I wasn't impressed. I pictured a girl in a wishing well, something four feet wide that a fireman could descend easily on a ladder. I soon discovered this was not the case. The well was less than a foot wide.
I hopped a plane and got to Odessa that afternoon. I rented a car but there were no celephones for rent. I had with me a duffle bag with a few clothes, a crude Radio Shack laptop, a small flashlight that could be stood on its base and swiveled, and lots of batteries.
I had to park several blocks away. Jessica was in a backyard well, and that house was surrounded by yellow tape. But the people in the house next door were allowing reporters in their backyard. A seven-foot wooden fence separated the two yards, and TV crews had erected a thicket of tall stepladders along the fence. Print and radio reporters stood in line for a brief look at the scene in the McClures' backyard.
There wasn't much to see besides lots of firemen and Jessica's mother, who sometimes sobbed and usually appeared alert and rather calm, considering the circumstances. Mostly, I saw what you saw on TV, because I watched the TV monitors set up haphazardly on a lawn that rapidly was becoming a patch of dirt. When Jessica finally was rescued, I watched it on TV and then ran out into the alley behind the houses to glimpse her rescuer running toward an ambulance. Her rescuer, by the way, committed suicide in 1995.
What I most remember was feeling cold all the time. I had not dressed warmly enough. Everyone got hungry and thirsty and that's why I want to say that the Salvation Army is one of the most wonderful organizations in the world. They handed out free hamburgers, coffee, donuts, and other items for the hungry hordes of reporters, firefighters, and cops. McDonald's gave the hamburgers to the Salvation Army.
I'm also thankful to the family who let us reporters tear up their backyard and use their phone. Other neighbors also provided phones and were extremely patient with us.
We reporters didn't understand how big the story was until Jessica was out of the well. The United States attacked an Iranian offshore oil platform, Nancy Reagan had a mastectomy, and there was controversy over a Supreme Court appointment, but Jessica led the network newscasts. I was amazed.
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