Happy birthday Lee 03-14-1960 to 05-07-1989

 

 

Life History of Lee Walter Eagar

By his brother Mark Eagar

 

 

 

Lee was born the 4th child of Maude VerDawn Gregerson Eagar and Walter Duane Eagar in Salt Lake City, Utah on March 14th, 1960 at LDS hospital. He weighed 5 pounds 13 ounces and was 19.5 inches long.  He was born on his mother’s birthday.  Had brown hair and brown eyes.  His doctor was Doctor Ellsworth. Lee was almost born on the way to the hospital since the LDS hospital is up on a hill there was snow on the roads so the family could not get up the hill. Finally, a police officer in a jeep carried them up to the top of the hill.

Lee had a reaction to cow's milk so his father would go every morning to a farm with goats and he would milk a goat to provide milk for Lee. The family moved to Sandy, Utah when he was 3 years old, then moved to Hurricane, Utah when he was 4.  The family moved to Artic Village, Alaska when he was 5 years old and spent 1 1/2 years there.  They moved to Vernal, Utah where he started kindergarten at Davis school.  They moved to the other side of Vernal to Naples where he started 1st grade the next year.   He got lost while camping in southern Utah.  The family looked everywhere for him, finally found him.  Baptized when he was 8 by Mark Rasmussen in Naples’s second ward.  Moved to Springville, where he went on hikes into the mountains, started 2^nd grade. 

He spent the 4^th grade in Cloudcroft New Mexico where the family lived on a ranch in the mountains.  His mother and the remaining children moved to Salt Lake City after his father left the family.   They lived in a basement in South Salt Lake provided for by Lee’s Uncle Art (Arthur Gregerson).  A year later Lee’s father Walter Duane Eagar returned and began helping with the family. Two years later his father remarried Ann Custer and he moved with him to American Fork, Utah. Experiences in American Fork at Junior High School.  Getting Lee a yearbook and getting it signed because I felt sad, he had not received one.  Went to a wilderness survival camp, which had a traumatic impact on him. He got frost bite on his toes. This was the first major manifestation of his schizophrenia. Working out (exercising) each night by himself.  Neurotic habits he struggled with such as washing his hands till they bled or rocking back and forth and walking around. No one to help him with the same. 

Went with me (age 15) when I moved out on my own because of dad's treatment of James. All the things we did together during that time, bought an old trailer, Lee went camping with James, the truck axle broke, moved with James and Lee to Lindon, looking for James when he disappeared, school, living in a trailer in Lindon, hurt my legs when trailer fell on them, and Lee was there to help me and comfort me.  going to SLC together to get the windshield fixed.  Worked on the trailer together.  eating, cooking, etc. together. 

Lee and I subsequently (after 4 months on our own) moved back in with Dad (the great reconciliation).  Lee left to go live with mom in SLC.  fights with James, trouble with the police, he would go walking at night and whend stopped by the police he would punch the police, bad decision and treatment for a mental disorder.  He would not take his medication and did not like it. He lived with James in North Salt Lake City for a while. He ran off to California when he was 20? while I was at Utah state university.

He lived on the streets, got beat up, and was robbed in Las Vegas on the way.  He became a homeless person in San Diego and was missing for 6 months.  We prayed for him and fasted for him. Lee was eventually picked up by the police as being catatonic, and unable to care for himself, and San Diego’s mental health services contacted Art (Artur Gregerson) who contacted me. I arranged with Art to have Lee flown home.  I went to the airport to pick him up. He was so glad to see us. He was on lots of medication. 

I took him to the doctor the next day, who said he should be committed to a mental hospital in Provo (what did he know??).  I put him in a mental hospital where he was in a locked area, with criminally insane people. This was a bad experience since he was not like them. I took him out on weekends to come to visit with me.  He helped at a gas station and seemed to enjoy that.  I took him driving in an old brown Chevrolet Vega, he wanted to learn to drive so bad, and tried so hard. Grandpa Custer took him sometimes, once he disappeared, had been caught shoplifting, and returned to a mental hospital.  later, released, and lived with James.

We took Lee down to southern Utah for a family reunion in an old ford with Tina and Elizabeth. Lee would not take his medication and became difficult to live with.  Grant took him, and they fought when Lee couldn’t get his cigarettes. Grant was so patient with him.  Lee and Grant got stuck in the mud in my Vega and got the clutch messed up, had to tow it to Leeds to fix it.   Lee rode home with Grant after visiting with everyone.  

David lived with James and Lee for a while and tried to help Lee. Grant lived with them for a while also and tried to help him.  Art and Monty took interest in him and began helping with medication, etc.  Dorothy and Mary had him come and stay with them and mothered him and tried to get help for him from the treatment center there in Midvale, Utah.  Mom tried to help him. 

Lee finally moved out and had an apartment of his own because he wanted to take the charge of his own life so badly.  Had James and Mom close, who both loved him and tried to help him.  I took Thanksgiving dinner down to James and mom and Lee one thanksgiving to cheer them up. Had pizza with Lee when we came down with kids another time.

Celebrated his birthday with him and his mother in SLC, Utah.  James understood him because of similar struggles and mental illness.  

Lee died on May 7, 1989, in his apartment with his roommate Mike, who was also in a treatment program for mental illness, and who was his friend.  Mike was mad at Lee so he poured a pot of boiling water onto Lee. Lee went to James to get some help but James would not open the door. Lee went back to his apartment and died in the tub. I visited his mother after his death to comfort her and make sure she was o.k.  Lee had temple endowment work been done for him one year later by his father in the Logan, Utah LDS temple?