Fort Morgan Times Fort Morgan, Colorado 03-07-02 K. Kauffman: Beating odds with positive attitude JOHN STAFFORD Wednesday, March 06, 2002 - Everyone who knows Ken Kauffman -- very nearly all the folks in Morgan County -- is well aware of the semi-retired farmer's positive outlook. He's worked hard all his life, and his successes are many, meeting every challenge in life with a sure smile and a winning attitude. But Ken and his family recently overcame a hurdle that may have been one of their toughest. A good country life The Kauffmans have a rich heritage in this area, one that dates back nearly 100 years to when his grandfather immigrated from Russia to establish a farm just northeast of Brush. "My granddad was a horse buyer for the Tsar," Ken says, "so when Nicholas II advised him to leave the country before the Bolshevik Revolution began, he moved to Colorado." Ken's father took over the farm in 1932, when Ken was a year old. He spent his youth in both Brush and Fort Morgan. He went to Fairview School through seventh grade in 1942 when the family relocated to a new farm near Fort Morgan, and in 1949 Ken graduated from Fort Morgan High School. "I went to Colorado A&M (now Colorado State University in Fort Collins) for a year," he recalls. "I was studying physical education. My dream was to become a coach." But when the Korean War broke out, duty called, and he joined the U.S. Navy, where he traversed the globe on the destroyer USS Hyman before serving several months off the coast of North Korea. During his four-year naval career he played football, even winning a tryout with the San Francisco 49ers. "We played against a lot of other military outfits and several small colleges," he remembers fondly. "We even played in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, although I'll bet there weren't more than 15 people in the audience." Leaving the military in 1955, Kauffman re-entered college at the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley, once again only for a year. "That's when I met Janet, and that was it. We were married in June of 1956, soon to be 46 years. It was the best decision of my life." The newlywed Kauffmans returned to Fort Morgan where Ken helped his father work a new farm for two years. Then wanderlust took over. "I had relatives in Orange County, Calif.," he says. "I used to visit them when I was stationed in San Diego, and it was beautiful country." When an opportunity presented itself, he took it. "I had a construction business there for two years," he says. "We helped build a new freeway." While their venture to the coast was a success, the old adage of not being able to take the country out of the boy -- or girl, for that matter -- proved true, and the Kauffmans returned to Morgan County two years later, this time for good. By then Ken's father had purchased another 80-acre farm about one-eighth of a mile from where he grew up. When his father retired in 1964, Ken bought the farm and began to expand it. During the next 10 years the farm grew to 640 acres. "We've grown sugar beets, corn, alfalfa and pinto beans in the past," says Kauffman, "but since 1969 we've dedicated ourselves to raising corn." >From 1971 to 1985 the Kauffmans won many awards for raising and showing Simmental cattle, a hearty breed originally from Switzerland. Queenie, one of their best, won every national award except the National Western, they proudly report. But their ag business wasn't the only thing the Kauffmans were growing. Through the years they raised a family, two boys and two girls. Dan, now 44, took to the farming life, staying to work the family land. Forty-two-year-old Diane, who travels the state as a manager for Hallmark Cards, lives in Larkspur. David, now 32, works as a CPA in Fort Morgan, and Deborah, 27, teaches second grade at Green Acres School. All are graduates of Fort Morgan High School and have begun to raise families of their own. Ken also served on the Morgan County Planning and Zoning Commission for 15 years but now calls himself "technically retired" although he continues to work with his son, Dan, in the family business. Tragedy strikes By the spring of 2001, the Kauffmans had reached the point where they were able to enjoy the fruits of their labors. Semi-retired, Ken and Janet spent as much time with their children and grandchildren as they could, attending the many sporting events in which the younger children participated. On Thursday, March 22, there was a scheduling conflict. One granddaughter was in a track meet in Niwot, and yet another was in a concert in Fort Morgan. To attend both, the grandparents had to split up. Ken drove to Niwot, and Janet stayed home. After the track meet, Highway 52 heading east was a continuous line of traffic, the caravan maintaining a steady pace just below the 60 miles per hour speed limit. At 5:30, Ken, in his 1992 Cadillac, was about two miles from Hudson where he would be able to leave the throng and turn onto Interstate 76. Suddenly, a red half-ton Ford F150 pickup pulled directly in his path from a side road. There was no time to react, and Ken's Cadillac smashed headlong into the violating vehicle. (The pickup's driver later pleaded guilty to taking the right of way but had no license or insurance.) The impact flipped Ken's car over and high into the air before it landed on its side in a ditch along the north side of the road. "It happened so fast, I don't remember much about it except I found myself unable to move. My right foot and ankle were trapped beneath the wreckage of the console and dash. I was conscious the whole time and thought I was all right." Rushing to his aid, the driver who'd been traveling close behind approached the wreckage. "Is anybody alive in there?" Ken remembers the man asking. All he could think of was to get hold of Janet. "I'm fine," Ken replied. "There's a cell phone in my pocket. Take it and call my wife." The man had a cell phone of his own which he used to punch in the numbers Ken gave him. But Janet wasn't home. "Ken always carries his cell phone," Janet says, "but he never ever calls me. This was a first, and, of course, I wasn't home," she adds through still ready tears. Ken instructed the man to call his son, Dan, and that call went through. Dan remembers hearing his father in the background as the man told him about the crash. Ken kept saying he was fine. He wouldn't learn until later just how wrong he was. Rescue units from the Hudson Fire Department were next on the scene, and the good Samaritan was able to tell Dan his father would be taken to the hospital in Brighton as soon as they could get him out of the car. That task proved to be much more difficult than anyone imagined. Trapped in the wreckage, Ken was in pain. "My right foot was caught and the seat belt had damaged my shoulder. The air bag had blown and I couldn't move." By then the helpful driver had crawled into the car with Ken. When one of the rescue workers asked, "How is he?" the guy answered, "He seems okay. He's telling me what to do." In the end it took three Jaws for Life to pry what amounted to most of the front end of the Cadillac from Ken's captured foot. "They somehow got me on a board and took me out through the rear window. By then I was in a lot of pain." By then the Flight for Life helicopter from North Colorado Medical Center was on scene. A quick assessment of the damage to Ken's broken body forced a new decision. "We're taking him to Greeley," Ken remembers someone saying. Meanwhile, Dan had rushed to the family home to find Janet who knew nothing of the accident. "I'd just finished a bath and was fixing my hair when Dan rushed in," Janet vividly recalls. "He told me Ken had rolled the Cadillac, but he'd heard him in the background of the phone call he'd received saying he was fine. I was immediately upset, but nothing could have prepared me for what we'd learn later." Dan and Janet sped down I-76 to the hospital in Brighton, where Dan had been told his father would be taken. "I was a basket case," Janet admits. "All I wanted to do was get to my husband, but Dan kept trying to calm me down, secure in what he'd heard his father say about being all right." Mother and son had neared Hudson when Dan spotted emergency lights in the distance on Highway 52. "I bet that's where it happened," he told his mother. "Let's go take a look." What they found was devastating. "Our car was destroyed," Janet says. "It looked like crumpled tin foil. I couldn't believe Ken had gotten out of the wreck alive." Dan asked someone where they'd taken the driver. Learning about the Flight for Life helicopter, they headed for Greeley. At the hospital, "We waited for a long time before anyone was able to talk to us," Janet says tearfully. "Finally, one of the doctors came out to see us. He told us they might have to amputate his right foot. It was insane. All that time we thought he was fine, then this news. It was crazy." The doctor also told them Ken would be in the operating room for a very long time, and they might as well go back home instead of waiting there. That's when the true story began to unfold. The physician they'd been talking to had removed Ken's ruptured spleen. The orthopedic surgeons were next. Ken had suffered major injuries. In addition to a smashed foot and ankle, Ken's left leg was fractured in three places; his right arm was broken, and his right shoulder had been crushed. The operations would take 17 1/2 hours just to repair his leg, right ankle and right arm. Another operation to attempt to reconstruct his right shoulder would take another five hours and be performed two days later. All this damage to a guy Dan had heard say he was "fine." The doctors were able to save Ken's ankle by piecing it back together with a plate and screws. His right leg required a rod to repair the damage of the three breaks to the femur. The smashed shoulder was another problem. Although artificial shoulders are available, the ball inside Ken's rotator cuff was so badly damaged there was nothing to attach to. "They told us the ball was so shattered it looked like spokes inside a wheel." After the operations, Ken's body was almost unrecognizable. His daughter, Diane, remembers identifying him by a tattoo he'd gotten in the Navy. Long road to recovery Long after the operations, Ken was confined to a hospital bed, totally immobile. "We had to feed him," Janet recalls. "It was just terrible. Here was my husband, a normally healthy and vital man, and he couldn't move." They soon learned Ken would probably be hospitalized for months -- maybe even a year. Ken had other ideas. "When I heard that, I said to myself: 'I'm not gonna lay here for six months or a year! I'm gonna get out of here and go home!'" Ken's positive attitude would see him through the hard times ahead. In total, Ken spent 86 days in hospitals. "After 10 days in Greeley," Janet recalls, "our daughter-in-law, Karen (a nurse at EMCH) worked with the hospital administrations to get Ken transferred to East Morgan County Hospital. It was nearer to home, and he could begin physical therapy." "The folks at the Brush hospital are great," says Ken. "I worked with LPN Steve Ingersoll and three different therapists, Roy Deslauriers, David Charbonneau and Sylvia Rivera. They were just wonderful!" Because the physical therapy department at EMCH is attached to the hospital, Ken was able to receive therapy throughout his 76-day stay. "They would use a crane-like affair to lower me into the warm water therapy pool," Ken remembers. "Janet told me it broke her heart to see me like that, but all I knew was I was going to get well. I slowly graduated from a wheelchair to a walker to a cane," Ken says, smiling. And he did it in under three months -- a far cry from the up to one year his doctors had predicted. Now, nearly a year after the accident, 70-year-old Ken still maintains his winning attitude. "They say I may be able to get rid of the cane by next year," he says proudly. "I may have a limp, but my right arm has healed perfectly. My left leg still hurts, but I can live with it. I don't like pain pills, so I won't take them. My shoulder may never be the same, but they don't think it would be beneficial to again try to reconstruct it. All in all, I feel pretty good." Ken Kauffman has adopted a philosophical perspective about the tragedy which forever changed his life. "My quality of life isn't what it used to be," he says. "But like a friend of mine once told me, it's better than being underground," he adds wryly. Janet Kauffman is having a harder time with it all. "I'm still working to forgive the man who has done so much damage to our lives," she says. "But I know the time will come when I'll be able to put it all behind me." -30- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- © 1999-2002 MediaNews Group, Inc. and Eastern Colorado Publishing Co.