Lance's Two Fathers
Ben Trovato
journalism than about Lance.
Lance Armstrong or defeating the fathers
by Françoise Inizan, Plano (Texas)
It's a flat, dreary countryside, broken only by church steeples and
large white crosses which rise into a sky frequently rent by a
tornado. A grim corner of Texas, where Lance Armstrong grew up with a
fixed hatred of his fathers, a pair of tutelary figures whom he never
accepted, and finally wiped from his past. The first, his biological
father, Eddie Charles Gunderson, had passed on the champion's genes
and his imposing physique. The second, his adopted father, Terry
Keith Armstrong, had first donated his name then forged the
instransigeant, exacting personality which made the ferocious
competitor we know. In their place, Lance Armstrong constructed the
myth of a single mom, Linda Mooneyham, who raised her little Lance
with no money. However, that's not exacty true. Some years ago,
Terry Armstrong sought out the media to try to refute a certain
version of history. Lance had immediately warned journalists: anyone
who approached the father would forfeit contact with the son. And
Terry soon found no one willing to lend an ear.
Nevertheless, these two fathers explain, doubtless far better than the
mother, who Lance Armstrong is. Perhaps they might even be the key to
that complex personality. They were also responsible for a setting -
the town of Plano and the Dallas suburbs - which Armstrong hated, and
where for a long time he was not much loved. They also furnish a
social snapshot, like a trip through an American heartland which seems
surreal: the early marriages and numerous divorces though we're in the
heart of George Bush's beloved puritanism, poverty and drugs, an
obsession with football stars which shoves other athletes into the
shadows... and youth bored to tears and ready to do anything, even
wrong, in order to get out.
The road to Kemp, south-east of Dallas. A neverending straight line,
interrupted by a multiplicity of crossroads and small-time commercial
strips dozing beneath the heat. At journey's end, on the banks of
Cedar Creek Lake, a dilapidated wooden house, seemingly silent and
empty. Beneath the grimy porch, an overturned motorcycle, scattered
trash, a dog's waterbowl buzzing with mosquitos.
Is this really the home of Eddie Gunderson, Armstrong's father? This
dump? Since the interview he gave five years ago to the Dutch
newspaper Algemeen Dagblad, in which he explained his tenuous
relationship with Lance, the man's gone to ground. At the time, he
said he worked at the distribution service of the Dallas Morning
News. But at the famous Texas newspaper, a few meters from the spot
where JFK was assassinated, no one’s heard of a Gunderson. According
to a police report from 2008, he was arrested at a stop light, not far
from there, in Gun Barrell City, pulled over for driving under the
influence, and in possession of 3.5 kilos of marijuana, 25 valiums,
and hallucinogenic mushrooms.
At the buzz of a dislocated doorbell, a young woman opens the door.
"Eddie Gunderson?"
"Yes, that’s here."
"Lance Armstrong's father?"
"Who? No, no way!"
She turns to a skinny guy who’s arrived in his pyjamas, obviously just
out of bed. Dulled blue eyes, blackened teeth. Stoned.
"Yes, it's here, but my father's not home."
It is in fact Dylan, 21 years old, the half-brother. The girl can't
believe it. She's wearing a yellow Livestrong wristband.
"You're Armstrong's brother? You never told me!"
The kid mumbles. "We don't talk about him... We've got nothing to do
with that guy, because he killed us. At first, I followed cycling, I
was interested in him, even if I'd never met him. And then I read his
book..."
Eddie Gunderson had married Linda Mooneyham in 1971, on the young
woman's seventeenth birthday. Linda was pregnant with Lance, who
would be born in september and named after Lance Rentzel, a star with
the Dallas Cowboys, the football team that ruled in Texas. A star
who'd ironically be fired that same year for sexual indecency. The
couple gets by, helped by their parents. On Linda's side, the family
is of modest means. Lance's grandfather drowns his difficult return
from Vietnam in drink, lives in a trailer. On the father's side,
Lance's grandmother, of Norwegian background, is just as impoverished,
but she watches the child now and then while the parents are at work.
Linda at the local Kentucky Fried Chicken. Eddie at the newpaper
distributor. A "white trash" environment, as they say in the US.
White, but quite a bit poorer than many ghetto blacks. In his
interview with the Dutch paper, Eddie defended himself: "Linda claims
I was always beating her. I'm no angel, but I don't remember beating
her like she said. I remember slapping her just once." On Lance's
first Tour victory, he also let fall: "I was his worst supporter. I
didn't want him to win at all."
In 1973, Linda and Eddie separated. Eddie's second marriage would
last barely three years, until his new wife put a bullet in her head
one day after a drinking binge. From his third marriage came Dylan
and Sonnie, the daughter becoming pregnant herself at age fifteen.
Then, after yet another divorce, Eddie remarried. Now he splits his
time between Dallas and Kemp. He hasn't seen Lance since he was
three, but one day he tried to find the champ's white villa in
Austin. In vain.
We ask to see Eddie. But Eddie's in hiding. He doesn't answer his
cell phone. Dylan tells lies non-stop, he whispers - barely able to
stand - that his father will come by, but the latter never shows up.
He's hiding out in Dallas where he lives when he's not in Kemp, where
there seem to be shady deals going on. Is he worried that his dubious
business arrangements will come to light? Too bad, his silence can't
be helped. We've got to be on our way to find Terry Armstrong.
Terry Armstrong receives us inhis salesman's office at a mushroom
company in Plano, a Dallas suburb. Not forthcoming at first, hands
clasped, back straight, he carefully answers our questions, and seems
to preach as he relates Lance's childhood under the eye of the
"Master", the Lord, who appears in a large poster behind him. Terry
is a very devoted Christian.
He speaks of love, repentance, occasionally weeping as he remembers
little Lance. Yes, in the end, he was an unfaithful husband that
Linda rightly decided to leave. But during the fourteen years he
raised Lance, until the boy was seventeen, he was a good father, very
present, who offered him everything, so he says. He too wears the
livestrong wristband. On the walls, you see photos of Lance
meticulously arranged. And on the closet, a picture of the
grandparents posing with Bush Sr. To tell the truth, everything in
this little office gives off the aroma of order and religiosity.
When Linda married Terry Armstrong in 1974 - the second of Linda's
four marriages - she was twenty, and Terry was twenty-two. But he
quickly adopted the child, perhaps remembering his own background.
His real name is Love, Terry Love. He too was adopted. "When I saw
that little baby in his bed for the first time, I immediately saw a
family... Lance tells everyone I'm his step-father. But I'm his
father. Whether he loves me or not, he can't get away from it. His
name is mine." Terry says that he was not the violent man the racer
described in his autobiography, a father who spanked or whipped him
for the slightest reason, just because he hadn't put something back
where it belonged properly.
"In those days, in the US, they still gave whippings in school. I
went through military school... Every time I whipped Lance, his mother
was there. But we'd always be fighting. Lance would go: 'I want to
go train!' I'd say back 'Do your homework first!' I had certain
values. "
Values like this: " In his first race, Lance fell and started crying.
I told him: 'That's it. I don't want a kind who cries and gives up.
If you start something, you go through with it. "
Terry: “Lance has always been black and white. You're either with
him or against him. Look at some of his former teammates who've
disappeared from his life. I think he's always felt abandoned, except
by his mom, who was always there in the long run. But it's the same
thing with the girlfriends he's gone through. My dad, who lives in
Paris, Texas, often says to me: 'Maybe it's his hatred for you that
fed his success...' " Maybe. Terry tried to see him again during a
race in Austin. "Lance didn't turn, he didn't look at me, he just
walked off with his bike. "
K. Fred Gauss
> My translation of a French newspaper article. Sez more about French
> journalism than about Lance.
Thanks for that observation, and the story too!
Anton Berlin
Frederick the Great
<7bee66b6-ea23-4cff...@5g2000yqz.googlegroups.com>,
Ben Trovato <benn.t...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> It's a flat, dreary countryside, broken only by church steeples and
> large white crosses which rise into a sky frequently rent by a
> tornado. A grim corner of Texas
Amarillo? Lubbock? Odessa?
No! Plano, Texas. Near Dallas, Austin, and
the Texas hill country of white limestone,
granite monoliths, and (yes) rolling, forested hills.
Heaven save me if I were to blackguard la belle France.
--
Old Fritz
Anton Berlin
--D-y
> In article
> <7bee66b6-ea23-4cff-ba0f-0e18c0e9c...@5g2000yqz.googlegroups.com>,
> Ben Trovato <benn.trov...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > It's a flat, dreary countryside, broken only by church steeples and
> > large white crosses which rise into a sky frequently rent by a
> > tornado. A grim corner of Texas
>
> Amarillo? Lubbock? Odessa?
>
> No! Plano, Texas. Near Dallas, Austin, and
> the Texas hill country of white limestone,
> granite monoliths, and (yes) rolling, forested hills.
>
> Heaven save me if I were to blackguard la belle France.
"Near"? To Austin? Not any way shape or form, except maybe for some
exceptions relating to the wearing of cowboy hats.
Austin is on the edge of the Hill Country, btw.
--D-y
CowPunk
> Texas is a shit hole. I've lived there enough to know.
It was only a shit-hole while you were living there. You smell worse
than cow shit and now that you are gone it's a much nicer place to
live.
Dan O
ACL - gotta love it! Reaches worldwide.
Betty
>> It's a flat, dreary countryside, broken only by church steeples and
>> large white crosses which rise into a sky frequently rent by a
>> tornado. A grim corner of Texas
Frederick the Great wrote:
> Amarillo? Lubbock? Odessa?
>
> No! Plano, Texas. Near Dallas, Austin, and
> the Texas hill country of white limestone,
> granite monoliths, and (yes) rolling, forested hills.
Anton Berlin
Spoken like a true resident of Canton Texas. I love your work in the
towns Tourism video. Who's the other actor behind you?
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/189689/october-28-2008/canton--ohio
Kurgan. presented by Gringioni.
DON'T MESS WITH TEXASS!! (it's not nice to pick on retards)