It sounded like a mysterious and obscure disease, anachronistic in the age of modern medicine. Yet last year in my adopted hometown of New York, we heard press reports of Legionnaires’ disease taking the lives of more than a dozen people clustered in the Bronx, the largest outbreak in the city’s history.
Legionnaires is no obscure illness; this strain of pneumonia hospitalizes thousands and kills hundreds of people each year, victims contaminated by air conditioners, hot tubs and other seemingly benign appliances. Last year’s tragedy unfolded in my city, the East Coast urban haven I now call home. As I followed the news coverage, I never dreamed that nearly a continent away, Legionnaires would also claim the life of a beloved family member in the deserts of Utah.
She was a golden beauty rivaling Grace Kelly: statuesquely tall, blonde locks and piercing blue eyes. And like Kelly, a Hollywood starlet during its Golden Age, elegance embodied. Her powerful voice was velvet steel, alternatively soothing and commanding. Crowned Miss USA at the tender age of 20, Charlotte Sheffield, my gorgeous aunt, was thrust into the spotlight, conquering the hearts of elite and everyday people around the globe.
She starred in various film, television and radio productions, traveled behind the Iron Curtain to then-Czechoslovakia as the face of that country’s Skoda automobile advertising campaign. She sang for nearly a decade in the famed Mormon Tabernacle Choir, her coloratura soprano reverberating across the cultural fabric woven around our nation’s milestones and world events.
While others would succumb to the trappings of fame, Charlotte was solidly grounded in the principles of compassion, service and wisdom by her sturdy parents, including my grandfather, a popular state lawmaker and public servant. This ensured the glitz and intrigue could not phase her. Charlotte was, as the ancient Greek philosopher Crates of Thebes taught, capable of “looking on generals and donkey-drivers in the same light.”
She married early at age 22, rebuffing the advances of wealthy and famous men in favor of a studious, homegrown man who shared her Mormon background. They raised eight children together who later produced 54 grandchildren and 20 great-grandchildren. Though they later divorced and Charlotte remained single afterward, she never wavered in her passion for family, romance and marriage. She refused to let heartache yield to bitterness.
As the years furrowed her brow and weathered her face–the effects of financial strain, divorce, and health problems (leukemia, a pedestrian victim of an auto hit-and-run, candida, among other things)–she remained a fount of cheerfulness, positivity and light. Even as she struggled financially, she always gave more than she received: to the homeless, the new immigrant, the outsider, the lonely straggler. She saw treasure and gold in those who society tossed aside, giving them jobs in her costume shop, visiting an ill parishioner, comforting a mourning widow.
Charlotte served as a sage counselor for many young women, including me. She intervened on my behalf at a vulnerable time in my life while I was a teenager facing estrangement from my immediate family. Her gentle guidance, love and savvy gave me the courage to recover and thrive after this harrowing period. I was but one of thousands whose lives were enriched by this bold woman.
Charlotte passed away April 15 at the too-young age of 79, surrounded by her loved ones after a brief battle with Legionnaires. Yesterday during her memorial service at her longtime Mormon chapel in the heart of Salt Lake City, one of her daughters read a poem Charlotte had written several years ago to her grandchildren. Called “Your Choices,” it was borne out of concern for a troubled teenage grandson who has since healed. It’s a call to ponder the ripple effects we have on others–an excerpt:
The whole world will tell you your life is your own
To taste without caution or care
But this is your chance to show what you stand for
And it would be wise to beware…
Remember my loved one – the choices you make
Will affect generations to come
And all your decisions whether foolish or wise
Will show all where you have come from
Charlotte came of age before today’s social media onslaught, our often crass and materialistic digital Wild West that decimates public figures and belittles idealistic dreamers. Yet even if the tools have modernized, there’s nothing new under the sun. Charlotte withstood those same negative forces and superficiality of her era. Her grace, family values and belief in the innate goodness of others drove this woman of faith in an era of doubt. Her timeless legacy will live for generations.