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- KIRK CHARLES (MAC) MCFARLIN (1930 to present) - U.S.MARINE - Contrac t and U.S. Gov't AIR PILOT
(Research by Peter Folsom McFarlin, Kirk's paternal 1st cousin - draf t of Jan 17, 2011, updated Aug 12, 2019)
Most of the following quotes in italics are from the Feb 9 2009 one ho ur interview between Peter McFarlin and his cousin Kirk "Mac" McFarli n in the Mary Ranchon Restaurante, Fronteras, Guatemala - between th e Rio Dulce and Lake Izabel.
YOUTH
Kirk Charles McFarlin was born in East Orange Memorial Hospital, New J ersey (NJ), on July 13, 1930, the second child of Charles Kirk and Ade laide (Hollenbeck) McFarlin who were living at 24 Delwick Lane, Shor t Hills, NJ at the time. (About 192 8 his mother Adelaide had given bir th to a baby girl who did not live.) Both he and his father were name d after their New Jersey/Ohio pioneer ancestors, the Andrew Kirk(patri ck) family. Kirk was often called Peter by his parents, so as not t o b e a 'junior'. Later in life he was called 'Mac'.
Kirk grew up there in Short Hills, NJ with his parents, younger brothe r Everett and a housemaid.
PHOTO OF MOM, KIRK AND ALLIE NEAR HERE
Mac; "I knew her; Peggy - and I thought she was a doll - she was a ver y, very nice girl. Of course I knew Donald, your dad, and I think abou t the last time I saw him was when his mother died ...(1949). I neve r knew Donald because he was never a round when I was and I was never a round when he was, I guess.
Kirk attended the fine local grammar schools nearby but his parents se parated him from his brother Everett.
Mac says "... there were conflicts between me and my brother, he was n ot in my world. They kind of had me going to different schools. Howeve r, Tabor got me - I was there for two and a half years. A year of summ er school and my two last years o f high school."
So, by 1947 he went to Tabor Academy in Marion, Massachusetts and grad uated from that preparatory school in 1949. Coincidentally, Kirk's fir st cousin Alison McFarlin's later-to-be husband, Leo Convery, also att ended Tabor, from 1948 to 1952. Wh en I (PFM) asked Kirk and Leo if the y knew of each other, they both told me they slightly remembered the o ther while at Tabor.
MARINES, CLAIRE BAKER, GENERAL MOTORS, FLYING
Two years later, by April 23rd 1951, Kirk had mustered into the U.S. M arines and was PFC in the 4th Recruit Trng Bn in Quantico VA. (MOS 350 0 basic mtr veh transport). In July 1952 he was in Hq Co 2nd Ord Bn 2n d Marine Div. (MOS 3531 heavy tran sport driver and repair). Then, in J an 1953, still in transport, he was in Camp Lejeune, NC. Fortunately , he was not called to the Korean war conflict which was officially fr om June 25 1950 to July 27 1953, when a cease-fire was agreed to.
When asked about Peter's father, Donald, Mac said; "I knew Alice an d I knew your dad in Jamaica...They were in business in a little retre at for professional people about 15 miles outside of Kingston, up in t he mountains. I was in the service an d our ship put into Kingston an d we were aboard ship (in the Marines). That was in about 1952 or 195 3 because we were down in the Carribean on an island off Puerto Rico . For some reason we went to Kingston at that time. It was about a ten -da y layover. At which time I grabbed a taxi and I went up to see you r dad who was up in the mountains, and drank lots of rum - ha,ha."
In 1953, while riding a train from his NJ home returning to his NC Mar ine station, Kirk met Claire Baker of Melrose, MA who was traveling t o Miami. She was twenty-one and he twenty-three. They corresponded, da ted and later married at Trinity Ch urch in Boston, MA in June, 1954. H e then went to Michigan with Claire and enrolled in the General Motor s Tech School there where he took business courses. While in Flint, Ki rk became very interested in flying and started taking lessons and g o t his flying credentials. Shortly before graduating from GM, he decide d what he really wanted to do was fly full time, and so left the GM pr ogram.
Mac; "And then on to college. That was the whole idea, to get me int o college. ...I went to General Motors Institute. It started off to b e a dealer/management course, then it went from there to engineering . One semester before I graduated, I qu it...because you were in schoo l part-time with General Motors, and they found out I was flying. The y didn't like that and they gave me a choice; either flying or workin g for General Motors. ...I could see myself out on the street after sp endi ng the good years of my life and with nothing. So I left them an d went to flying."
Kirk and Claire had one child; Claire Joyce McFarlin, who was born 1 4 Dec of 1955, in Flint, MI. Claire, and their daughter Claire, live d variously in Flint and then Melrose, Massachusetts with her family w hile Mac pursued his flying career.
GUATEMALA
Peter's question; "What first brought you to Guatemala?"
Mac; "It was on a trip to Venezuela ... about the end of '55, afte r I married claire in '54. - I flew down....it was in a Piper...it wa s a small single engine - tail dragger type"
Peter; "You flew the plane?"
Mac; "Yeah, my father was on a business trip for RIFE and wanted to se e some people in this country, and then all the way down into South am erica, but I got here and I liked it - so I stayed here and he kept o n going, in a commercial plane. I g ot here in Guatemala and I liked it ..."
Kirk's father's business; the Rife Hydraulic Engine Manufacturing Co , had contracts in central America and so he flew his father to Guatem ala where they engineered and installed, for the coffee industry, som e of the gravity-impulse water system s made by Rife. These systems ar e non-electric, purely hydraulic/mechanical and are perfect for drivin g a percentage of confined, flowing water back uphill, especially in p laces where there is no electricity.
Mac; "...and I stayed. And I went back to the States and got my commer cial license, because I had signed a contract with two farms to crop d ust their cotton. So I stayed in the crop dusting business, really u p until the time we left for Africa. "
So, Kirk fell in love with the country and decided to stay there. Clai re and their daughter rejoined him there in Guatemala City in 1959. Hi s daughter Claire (McFarlin) Viviani wrote Peter in 2008 ; "he and m y mother decided that she and I woul d move down to Guatemala and the y would try again. This would have been in 1959. At the time, he was c rop dusting with a bi-wing plane. He was not at home very much as hi s work took him out of the city a lot. After that was when he had an a ir- service business out at the airport, because I remember going t o a hanger...He shared close quarters with Guatemalan workers while i n the dusting business and quickly learned Spanish. During this tim e I attended the American School and continue d there for the ten year s I lived in Guatemala, an excellent school which provided me with a b ilingual education... When I was about nine years old my parents decid ed to get divorced, as they seemed to have gone their separate ways; e ach of th em remarried Guatemalan citizens. Shortly after that my fathe r moved to Liberia, Africa with Gina his new wife."
Mac; "...so, that was my start here in Guatemala, and I liked it and t he money was good. I got here about 1957. In 1958 I made a company 'c ause in the aviation here they passed a law saying no more pilots coul d come in for crop-dusting unles s they had a company and here if you h ad a company you're automatically entitled to participate in any par t of that company's business. So that let me fly right up until '64.
In December, 1964, Kirk married twenty-year-old Lydia Regina Menende z who was living then in Guatemala City. She was from the small town o f Chiquimula, about 60 miles east in the City. Claire and her new Guat emalan husband, Edwardo Sagastume (t hey married about 1965), remaine d in Guatemala until 1969 when they moved with her daughter Claire t o Ann Arbor, Michigan.
LIBERIA
Soon after, in 1965, Kirk and Gina left for Liberia, Africa where he w as under contract for two years as a bush-pilot. "When '64 came in I l eft for Africa for two years....under contract. It was a verbal contra ct, they paid the tickets."
Peter; "What did you do there?"
Mac; "Fly! Fly the whole time. Yeah, we supplied the diamond mining in dustry. Liberia. but that was not a place where you want to reside per manently... I remember there was a fellowthat I wass going to do som e business withover there, found a n 87 carat diamond. The guy went nut s and sold it right away there in Monrovia and I don't know what he di d but the first thing he probably did was buy a white Mercedes. And th at was that. Because deveryone over there, for prestige, had a whit e M ercedes. They took that diamond to ...Amsterdam and they sold it for $ 230,000. What the guy in Liberia got for it I don't know. ...I was goi ng to go into the river, on the bottom, instead of the placer edges.
Peter; "...you went into the mining yourself?"
Mac; "I didn't get into it because of the guy - like I said -
"Yeah, I had all the equipment ready to buy and U.S. Divers gave u s a 50% discount on all the diving equipment, and it would have kept m e there awhile. But, after two years we decided to take a trip to Euro pe to vacation, ...we never got ther e because a cable from Washingto n came in with the invitation to go to Vietnam. We just packed up ever ything, sold our Volkswagon and went back to the States. We had to ge t visas and all, and from there we went to Taipai for two weeks and th e n into Saigon".
So, after the west-Africa job, Kirk and Regina returned to the State s in Dec of 1966 and stayed for two months with his parents in Short H ills, NJ. In a 1967 letter to PFM from his uncle Kirk McFarlin; "We ha ve been enjoying a visit from our ol der son Kirk Jr, called Peter, an d his wife while en route from two years in Liberia to a contract in F ormosa and Indo China. Under contract as pilot for three years..."
FAR EAST FLYING - AIR AMERICA
The Vietnam War occurred in Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam from 1959 to 19 75. US involvement escalated in the early 1960's and combat units wer e deployed beginning in 1965.
Peter; "So you went over to Saigon, and you were starting to fly the n for Air America I think? Correct?"
Mac; "Yes that was for five years. That was good experience"
Starting in 1967, Kirk flew special operations missions for Air Americ a in those contested areas. The following is from Wikipedia (2008); "A ir America's slogan was 'Anything, Anywhere, Anytime, Professionally' . This was not an exaggeration as A ir America aircraft, including th e de Havilland Canada DHC-4 Caribou and Fairchild C-123 Provider, fle w many types of cargo and people ... to countries such as the Republi c of Viet Nam, the Kingdom of Laos, and Cambodia. It operated from bas e s in those countries and also from bases in Thailand and as far afiel d as Taiwan and Japan. it also, on occasion, flew top-secret mission s into Burma and the People's Republic of China."
Kirk and Regina had two daughters while in the Far East; Regina (Gina ) Maria McFarlin was born in 1967 in Saigon, Vietnam, and her sister L issa Michelle McFarlin was born in 1969 in Vientiane, Laos. In 2008, h is daughter Gina goes on to say tha t her dad did a great deal of perso nnel insertions and removals to save civilian lives while in the Far E ast. In 2006, Kirk refers back to his time when flying the Canadian d e Havilland Caribou twin engine DHC-4 (further designated by the U S a s the C-7 in 1967).
PHOTO OF CARIBOU NEAR HERE
Mac;"Just wanted to mention I have about 2500 hrs Caribou time. It wa s my favorite for special ops, close in air drops and balls-to-the-wal l flying".
During 1967-1971, Air America's 'Captain Kirk' McFarlin also belonge d to the Far East Pilots Association.
Mac; "...I would have stayed with them, but of course, that folded, an d there was no more of that. However, I did go to Washington to try t o get back in. If not there, then somewhere else. And then that wa s a bad time for 'The Company' becaus e they were being investigated b y Congress."
Peter; "Air America? The Far East Association?"
Mac; "Yeah, The Far East Association. So there was just no way to ge t in. In fact they said they were just waiting for attrition to take i t's course. They weren't hiring anybody.
In another letter to PFM in 1971, Kirk's father Kirk (sr) writes; "... our family from the far east came on for their vacation. In September , after they had been back only a few weeks, they pulled up stakes, an d have been with us off and on sinc e that time, a period of great joy , because our Peter (=Kirk) had come through almost five years of cont act with the North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao without injury." He furth er writes; "...now we are leaving on Dec 12, 1971 to take our oldes t g rand daughter Claire (16) with us on a journey we hope will take us ar ound the world and give her the same thrill which we have found in th e Far East."
BACK IN TEXAS, MEXICO and SOUTH AMERICA
From about 1978 to about 1984, cousin Kirk and his second family wer e in the Brownsville, Texas area. Kirk worked for the State Dept o n a 'black passport'.
Mac; "That didn't make me at all happy because they took out income ta x, and what was left -- and I was 'outside'- (Kirk was working in Mexi co at the time) - wasn't worth continuing. So after that year I left . and I got back in, to a contractin g operation. We worked anti-drug s - not DEA. We were different, we were State Department. But it was s till anti-drugs. We supported DEA in a lot of cases. So I went on wit h them as a pilot, and it was in '91 I think it was- they made me sit e m anager for the operation here in Guatemala. Because we had been al l over South America and finally the contractors brought me here to Gu atemala."
THE RIO DULCE - GUATEMALA
Mac; "...and I was there until I had passed 60. They didn't want peopl e older than 65. So, my contract expired and they didn't renew it. Tha t was when I decided to build a house. The property where the house i s we bought in '78...the house wa s built in '91."
Daughter Gina relates that her father and mother later (about 1989) se ttled back to the Rio Dulce River area of Guatemala near the town of F ronteras. To get around to different places on the river (Rio), you mu st travel by boat. All homes and b usinesses on the Rio have a boat doc k.
In 2003, Kirk writes to PFM, "After thirty-four years flying in differ ent parts of the world, we are in a completely different environmen t - boats. It's hard to believe that after being a contract pilot doin g 200 miles/hr and going from countr y to country, here we are doing 1 5 mph...The reason behind this is that our house is here and we live h ere...on the Rio Dulce, one of the most picturesque areas of all Centr al America... I and another American built the house with a helper. F o ur bedroom, two bath in partial 'post and beam' design all of processe d pine. The wood building is a blessing as it stays cool even on the h ottest days. Being right on the river and up on a rise makes for a nic e location. It is a refuge for t he sailboats cruising the Caribbean du ring the hurricane season so we have lots of people from all over th e world to enjoy."
In 2008 he and wife Gina still lived there on the Rio Dulce River in G uatemala, which connects Lake Izabal to the Caribbean Atlantic. Kirk' s wife Gina would sometimes return to their apartment in Houston to b e near their daughters Gina and Liss a. Kirk returned to Houston fo r a few weeks in October for their daughter Gina's wedding.
Mac; "It gets hot down here...I like the hot weather. I'm not a cold w eather person....Where we live we have a forest on one side of us an d the normal flow of air comes right through that forest to us and out . Actually I spend a lot of time o n the computer. I'm a big game play er. I play cribbage, with a group that plays for tokens, not for money . No, I've played a lot of games for money.
"Somebody said; 'The day you die, everything will be even, you will no t have won and you will not have lost'."
When Peter and Karen stopped for their Feb 9th, 2009 luncheon meetin g with Mac at the Fronteras restaurant, he had come over by boat fro m his home on the Rio. Peter gave Mac some family biographies he had j ust written as well as some family gen ealogy.
This was the only time first cousins Peter and Mac were ever to be tog ether. Totally worth it!
photo of peter and kirk near here
CLAN MACFARLANE and DNA CONNECTIONS
Mac was agreeable to have his Y-DNA studied with Family Tree DNA, alon gside Peter's and other distant MacFarlane cousins. This is to help de termine our older ancestry, prior to our known connection back to Joh n McFarland (ca1750-1800) and his w ife Margery (Anderson) McFarland (1 756-1838), of Coitsville, Ohio.
In Dec 2015 Peter wrote an email to Mac, and daughters Gina and Lissa : "Kirk's 111 tested gene markers came out as an exact match to mine . This is certainly confirmation of our close genetic relationship o f our male descent. Exact matches are n ot always to be expected...I ca n confirm that we are all certainly descended from the early Earls o f Lennox (from the 1100 and 1200's) and then somewhere later through t he Chiefs of MacFarlanes."
Mac immediately wrote back; "Thank you so much for your email with th e ancestry information. It was super interesting...We are stilll in th e throws of selling here. What exactly are our plans afterwards is sti ll up in the air. Maybe we can ge t together and spend some time. I mis s the north-east...I always loved Maine. I needed a seaplane rating so me years back and got it up there. Beautiful....Mac and Gina. Then fur ther; "Yes, the house in Guatemala is for sale. I want out so we ca n d o something. Gina wants to travel. And I want to fish. We'll see."
In 2019, 89 year-old Mac was mostly back in Houston being cared for b y his family. He had to return there for treatment of some mini-stroke s. They were still trying to sell his home on the Dulce.
The genetic connection studies are ongoing. PFM - August ?? 2019
Sources;
Peter F McFarlin (PFM)'s personal research, plus;
1967-1977 letters to PFM from uncle Charles Kirk (b1892) McFarlin
1974 PFM's personal interview with; Charles Kirk McFarlin
2003-2019 emails from Mac (b1930) McFarlin
2008-2019 interview and emails from Gina (b1967) McFarlin
2008-2019 info and emails from Claire (McFarlin) Viviani
2008-2011 info and emails from Claire (Baker) Sagastume
2009 interview between Peter and Karen McFarlin and his 1st cousin Kir k Charles McFarlin (b1930)
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d. 2 Apr 1977, Livingston, Essex, New Jersey, USA