Kay and Randy Bond
Randy & Kay Bond, both 57, began their work for international peace during the Faith and Resistance Retreats/Actions in l987. In l993, they went with a Michigan Peace Team delegation to intervene in the violence in Bosnia. They went to El Salvador, in l994, as observers to that country's democratic elections. In November, l995, they were part of a delegation that supported the beginning of the Christian Peacemaker Team in Hebron in the occupied West Bank. Randy returned to Hebron for three months in 1996, and went to Iraq in l997. Kay and Randy anchored the long term Michigan Peace Team in Chiapas during much of l998-2000. They have also participated in numerous MPT peacekeeping efforts throughout Michigan as well as MPT trainings in nonviolence.
In the summer of l998, they left their inner city home and work in Grand Rapids (Kay as founder and ten-year director of In The Image, a free store of furniture and clothes for homeless, the mentally disabled, and poor; Randy as an engineer at Steelcase). The Bonds moved to a wooded area in Beulah, "off the net," built a small home, and decided to dedicate the rest of their lives to peacemaking at home and abroad.
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Bernard and Patricia Odernheimer
Bernard Odernheimer
Born as a German citizen of the world since April 1,1941. Analytical chemist, doctorate in engineering; worked for the German federal government (MOD/chemical defense, trace-level detection of toxic chemicals, till end of Cold War; Foreign service 1989-1996, delegate to the Geneva Conference on Disarmament, conclusion and implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention; Preparatory Commission for the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), The Hague). I retired in 1996. Son, 29, daughter, 26, study law in Berlin resp. Hamburg. European travels with Patty (2nd marriage) in our camper for 2 years; moved from Germany to Michigan Jan 99, to do something totally different and settle down some more . . .So we became organic small-scale farmers in Marilla! Then after 911 "nothing was the same any longer".
Patricia Odernheimer
I was brought up in AuGres, Mi. Married at 18 to a chemical engineer employed at Dow Chemical so I lived in Midland for 18 years. I had my own home care business for about 7 years there, had two children and then we moved to Germany with Dow. I was divorced in 1988 and married Bernhard in 1993, we travelled extensively in Europe and while we were in Geneva I worked for three years at the World Health Organization in the AIDS Department. We then decided to travel, as Bernhard said above, and finally moved back here so I could be near my family.
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The Traverse Area Peace Community gathers to honor our peace delegation
