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THIS PAGE IS DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF:
WILLIAM KIMBERLY SMITH (September 29, 1953 - November 30, 2000)
~Brother Up In Heaven~ Lyrics
Christopher's Tribute to Kim
PAGE INITIATED: JANUARY 20, 2001.
LAST UPDATED: AUGUST 18, 2002!
WILLIAM KIMBERLY SMITH ('Kim')
Born: September 29, 1953, Great Falls AFB (Malmstrom AFB), Great Falls, Montana.
Died: November 30, 2000, Kalispell, Montana, by suicide.
Faith, Tess, and Kim at Faith's house, December 24, 1999. Our last Christmas together. :-(
Photo taken by me, using my Samsung Maxima 105 Zoom camera and Kodak Gold MAX 800 film.
The memory board from Kim's memorial service, First Presbyterian Church, Kalispell, Montana, December 8, 2000. Photo taken by
me, using my Samsung Maxima 105 Zoom camera and Kodak MAX Zoom 800 film.
Me, delivering Kim's eulogy during the memorial service at First Presbyterian Church, Kalispell, Montana, December 8, 2000. Photo taken by my long-time friend,
Geoff Wrigg, using my Samsung Maxima 105 Zoom camera and Kodak MAX Zoom 800 film.
NOVEMBER 30, 2000: The dynamics of our family have been irreparably altered. :-( Kim chose to check out of life prematurely, despite
all the love we gave. The cost of the loss is incalculable, the pain we all feel will take years to subside, and the emptiness we
all feel inside shall never be filled again. Someday we may know all the answers, but let me say that Kim's life was not one lived
in vain, that he was loved by all who knew him well, and that we shall all miss him very much.
DECEMBER 8, 2000: Kim's memorial service. Our pastor delivered a sermon and I delivered a eulogy that are
both still getting rave reviews from those who were there. Unfortunately, nobody taped it! I will include below some of the thoughts I touched on during my eulogy, from my outline. I will also include thoughts not in the eulogy,
that will tell the world more about who he was, and what we all love and miss so much about him.
What made Kim special unto himself and unto God?
Kim was a very loving, caring, and giving person. He sacrificed so much of his young adulthood from 1972-1978 to keep
Faith and I together with Mom in the same house after Dad left in 1972. He worked odd jobs as a service station
attendant in West Carrollton and Kettering, a tobacconist in Franklin, and as a night clerk/auditor for the LK Motel in
Huber Heights. All the while he was trying to take college courses at Wright State
University in Fairborn. Also, he was someone who did his best to follow the Golden Rule: to do unto
others as he would have done unto him, even though, so many times in his life, he was done unto in ways he never would
have done to them. Had it not been for the wrongs done unto him by the then elders of our church in the late '80s,
and the wrongs the then-Outlaw Inn ownership did unto him in 1993, his depression may have not gone so far that he felt no
other way out.
His greatest joys came in preaching the Good Word, in our own church in Kalispell and the smaller outlying congregations
in our presbytery, as well as in central and eastern Iowa when he was a seminary student at the University of Dubuque. He
also reveled in spending time with the family, and trying to help Faith raise her 'trio' as a mentor and disciplinarian when
needed. (And let's not forget "Big Brother's Auto Repair & Taxi Service"! LOL ) He enjoyed communing
with nature, mainly because of the time he spent as a young boy with Grandpa Carl at Glacier
National Park. Kim was an avid hunter and fisherman, as well as a very good photographer, using Grandpa Carl's 1946
vintage Kodak Signet 35 camera up until 1998.
Kim's other hobbies included humor (our wicked, twisted brand and any humorists in that mold), classical music, classic
literature and science fiction. Kim would never fail to find some way to make you blush by turning a word or phrase
inside out to expose double meanings. If you weren't careful, you'd be in trouble! LOL
And as 'Little Bro' embraced the new technologies of this age, Kim would ask my advice and watch over my shoulder as I
got connected first with CompuServe and BBSs in the '80s, and CircuitNet and the Internet in the '90s. Eventually,
he, too, would get connected, and we would help each other out on hardware and software problems and fixes, and he also
joined the CircuitNet family (by then on the web), among others, talking about his Jeep ('Joe', which we didn't know),
science fiction, religion (of course), humor (natch), and classical DE-composers (HIS joke, not mine!).
Classic moments for the family
July, 1969 The first major news event I remember lucidly was watching Neil Armstrong's "one small step for man,
one giant leap for mankind" on CBS-TV. I can still remember Kim gathering us all together around our Motorola
black-and-white set and trying to find film for the 3M Instamatic 126 camera to snap the moment for our scrapbook. (We
were out of film, too.)
August 1, 1978 We helped Kim pack up his '74 Plymouth Barracuda for the trip out to Kalispell to spend time
with Grandpa Carl and Grandma Sue en route to finishing college at Whitworth College. Kim
gave me his copy of Cheech & Chong's Big Bambú album (and his room) before leaving.
May 17, 1980 After Kim got to Whitworth, he met Tess, and they eventually decided to get married. No one
but the geologists could have predicted Mt. St. Helens would blow up the next day, so we were all in Spokane for the
wedding, and got trapped in the ensuing ash cloud. I still remember Aunt Martha coming out on the lawn to tell
Dad and Faith and I about it as we got in from a grocery run (which we thought was a nasty thunderstorm en route...).
July, 1983 A once in a lifetime event for us, unfortunately, as Dad's funeral brought all five of us Smiths
together in the same place at the same time, for the first (and only) time. Kim, Faith and I all took turns driving
from Montana to Missouri, Sam flew in from Chicago, and Andy flew in from Denver and got a SWEET Lincoln Town Car for a
rental. The four of us brothers played pinochle, as Sam and Kim beat their younger counterparts, and all four of
us took turns wreaking humorous havoc upon our one and only sister, with help from her then-husband (who got emergency
leave from the Army and flew in from Germany). The only photo taken of us five together was lost in her trailer fire
New Year's Day 1987.
May, 1995 The last major road trip Kim and I would take together, as we went from Kalispell to Mountain Home,
Idaho (which he had been at only in utero in 1953), the Golden Spike NHS, Salt Lake City, the Bonneville Salt Flats,
Jackpot, Nevada, and Craters of the Moon NM. (photo to scan later)
Christmas 1999 (See pic above.)
Thanksgiving 2000 The signs were there, yet we failed to take action. His electro-shock in Spokane that
October wore off too soon. Could we have done more to prevent it? Perhaps. It would only have prolonged
his suffering, though.
WHAT I WILL MISS ABOUT KIM THE MOST
His back and shoulder rubs. No one else got the 'knots' out better.
His wicked sense of humor.
His late-night phone calls, which almost always began with Kim saying, "Yo, bro!" and my reply, "Isn't that some kind of musical instrument?", and almost always ended with Kim saying, "Goodbye, or as they say in the
German laundry business, 'Out peterstain'!"
Working on cars or computer problems together. (We were very much our father's sons!)
And last, but not least, his angelic deep baritone voice singing "The Trumpet Shall Sound" from Handel's
Messiah at Christmas each year. We had a Reader's Digest LP set called Joyous Music For Christmas
Time that Kim literally wore the grooves out of on that one passage of highlights from the Messiah (with the sung intro of the previous recitative included) [Movements #47 and 48 for those who want to find it on an album]. I couldn't think of a tribute to him more appropos for a December memorial service than playing that song. I had to
fight to get it in the program, but I did it for 'Big Bro'.
I introduced the song in the eulogy as follows:
"Listen to the immortal words of George Frideric Handel, and know that there is hope; that someday, we will all see
Kim again:
Behold, I tell you a mystery;
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be chang'd,
In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet,
The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be rais'd,
Be rais'd incorruptible, and we shall be chang'd.
(Scripture reference: 1 Corinthians 15:51-53)
Wherever you are Kim, know that we loved you and we miss you very, very much."
I have preserved the September 1, 2000 version of Family Page #1, recalling what he meant to us.
Mom taught us by example just how important the family is. May we never forget that lesson. :-)
Ian Bairnson, the long-time guitarist for Alan Parsons, wrote this song about the death of his first cousin, Erik Mounsey,
who was one of the US Army Blackhawk helicopter pilots shot down by 'friendly fire' in 1994 during Operation Provide Comfort. Erik was like a brother
to Ian, and the lyrics reflect this relationship.
The lyrics fit my brother so well, too. I am including the lyrics here as an everlasting tribute to him.
BROTHER UP IN HEAVEN
Words and music by Ian Bairnson
As performed by Alan Parsons (On Air, 1996)
(Vocals: Neil Lockwood (ELO Part II) )
A boy flies for freedom
But dies for the peace
In the clouds, he waits for an answer
But there's no release
It's strange here without you
And it's so hard to see
So brother up in heaven
Please wait up for me
Oh brother up in heaven
Please wait up for me
I still see his shadow
His laugh lingers on
When I dream, we're all back together
When I wake, he's gone
It's strange here without you
This was not meant to be
So brother up in heaven
Please wait up for me
And though we tried to change the world
A flower when it's cut will surely die
So why do men with so much hate
Destroy what they cannot create
While we all stand by?
(Acoustic guitar solo)
We look back in anger
But you helped us to see
So brother up in heaven
Please wait up for me
Oh brother up in heaven
Please wait up for me
Donna Bell's tribute page to Kim
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