‘There was another, then another, then another’: On death & the ‘Iron Claw’ Von Erichs

The tears will vanish eventually, some by tomorrow night, a few hours after the last sod is tapped in place over Kerry Adkisson “Von Erich.”

But the fear will stay forever.

“Every day of their lives, every day of their children’s lives, that whole family will fear” whether someone else will die by suicide, said Peggy Smith of Saginaw.

Smith, 43, doesn’t share the Von Erichs’ showbiz fame. But she knows their pain.

Like their family, she and her three sisters buried three brothers who died by suicide.

“When one brother sets an example, I would say there’s a 75 percent chance another may follow,” she said.

“Each one just leaves that much more pain to deal with.”

From behind her chair at a hair salon in a Fort Worth suburb, she watched the Adkisson/Von Erich family tragedy spill across the evening news Friday for the fourth time in nine years as a five-brother Texas wrestling act crumbled to only one.

Like her own brothers, she speculated, the Adkissons may never have talked enough to overcome grief from the death of elder brother David in 1984, then the deaths by suicide of younger brothers Mike in 1987 and Chris in 1991.

Sometimes, man-to-man talks only amount to: “You OK?” “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Maybe they all blamed themselves,” she said.

“We didn’t talk at all. We were so afraid of another suicide, we never talked. ... We were ashamed.”

Years before, her father had died by suicide. Her brothers followed in 1975, 1981 and 1987, leaving four sisters to sort out the pain.

“There was another, then another, then another,” she said.

“I couldn’t talk about it. I couldn’t even think about it.”

The Adkisson deaths came much more quickly, beginning with Mike.

“That left three brothers trying to deal with it,” Smith explained.

“The second [Chris], he gets on hard times. He’s not old enough to understand that hard times pass, so he says, ‘I’m going, too.’ That leaves twice the pain.

“And the third [Kerry], he’s dealing with all that, he’s dealing with fame, he’s dealing with expectations the world has that he can’t live up to.”

Mary Archer, a counselor with the Survivors of Suicide group of the Tarrant County Mental Health Association support agency, was more blunt.

“Kerry kept wrestling without a foot?” she asked.

“Obviously that family kept a lot of secrets. He didn’t want anybody thinking he was weaker — that male stuff. I don’t think that family has ever come to grips with any of this pain.”

The weight of every death gets heavier, Smith said, with “a lot of grief and a whole lot of guilt.

“There’s all the ‘Why couldn’t I have done something?’ and ‘Why didn’t I know?’ “

In the Adkisson family, the heaviest burden now hangs around the shoulders of Kevin, the last brother.

“He’s got to be told,” she said — “it’s not his fault. It’s not the father’s [Jack/Fritz’s] fault.

“The Bible says, ‘Lean not into thine own understanding.’ He won’t understand it all.”

She made me promise to end this column with the familiar words of encouragement to Kevin and anyone who might be despondent:

“Put down that every person is a valuable human being.

“Put in there, ‘This, too, shall pass.’ “

For the sake of Kevin Von Erich, and for Kerry’s daughters.

And for their children for years to come.