By Cathy Tilzey
Mary LaFond, chosen
this spring as the 2006 Montana Mother of the Year, has a strong devotion to
family and has brought her family together for three reunions. She treated co-workers
like family, and is devoted to her Catholic faith.
A member of the
Cathedral of St. Helena, she was nominated by a friend, Jo Ann Prost, who is
on the Montana Mothers Association selection committee. The Knights of Columbus
council in Malta sponsored her.
“It’s
very humbling,” she said in a recent interview.
LaFond attended
a luncheon and meeting April 11 in Sidney, where she received a pin and certificate.
She was also elected president of the Montana association.
The KC council
in Malta sponsored a dinner for her whole family, and all of them attended.
She and her husband,
Maynard LaFond, are moving back to Malta this summer, where both graduated from
high school. They were married at St. Mary’s Parish there and their five
children were born and reared in Malta, so they have lots of connections, she
said.
LaFond was born
in Helena and adopted from Shodair Children’s Hospital by Elmer and Loretta
Bahn of Richland. Elmer Bahn managed grain elevators in that area, then the
family moved to Billings.
She said she started
her education at St. Theresa of the Little Flower School when it opened in Billings.
She finished grade school and one year of high school at Holy Rosary Parish
in Bozeman. Then her parents returned to Malta where she finished high school
and met Maynard.
Mary and Maynard have been married 43 years and have 14 grandchildren.
The couple moved
to Helena in the late 1960s. She worked in the governor’s office for 20
years and as a budget analyst. She also enjoyed working at the Department of
Justice as bureau chief of records and driver control. She said her boss was
Dean Roberts, whose mother, Irene Roberts, was Montana Mother of the Year in
2005.
Maynard LaFond
did concrete work in Malta and Helena and worked for the state. One of his jobs
was to plant the flower gardens in front of the Capitol each year. He and Mary
are now retired.
After Mary’s
mother died in 1967, her father encouraged her to find her birth mother. But
she didn’t feel ready then, she said. In 1985, she was driving near Shodair
Hospital and decided to stop there and ask to see her records.
The clerk couldn’t
reveal her birth mother’s name, but did mention a physician and a priest
who might talk about her. LaFond knew both men, who told her the whole story.
She also learned that she has two half brothers; one is deceased.
Her birth mother
was living in Billings. They met and have been close ever since. Her mother
even met her adoptive father, who thanked her profusely for Mary’s life
and adoption.
On a visit to Malta,
LaFond talked about it with Monsignor Martin E. Werner, for whom she worked
while living there. He encouraged her to tell the story to the newspaper for
the Great Falls-Billings Diocese, as an example of the importance of family
unity.
LaFond has applied
that example to three family reunions.
When her father
became ill in 1993, she started planning one for his family. He died before
the weekend reunion in 1994, but she went ahead with it. Many Bahn relatives
celebrated all the holidays, from New Year’s to Christmas.
She said it was
rewarding to see cousins who had never met before visiting and sharing their
stories.
In 1996, a LaFond
family reunion attracted 96 members. Holidays were celebrated again.
The third reunion
was in 2001 for the Bahn family, with older members showing the younger ones
what family life was like several generations ago.
“You need to keep families united and let younger generations know what
family means,” LaFond emphasized.
It’s part of her philosophy, along with a quote from the Our Lady of Perpetual Help devotion, that people need to “understand that our lives belong to others as much as they belong to ourselves.”
Published in The Montana Catholic, Vol. 22, No. 7, July 21, 2006.