Page 130 - Complete Final Book2

Class Profiles
by Carol Biliczky Levandoski

Bob Krebs

If you want to talk tires, turn to Bob Krebs. And when the subject turns to cancer, he’s your man, too.
First, the tires. Bob earned an associate degree in 1972 from the Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics, where he
studied and roomed with fellow MHS buddies Terry Scherz and Ken Naftzger. After graduation, Bob joined
Rockwell International as a production foreman and, a few years later, BF Goodrich as a research associate.
Over the next several years, he held a potpourri of jobs testing race car tires, managing farm tire sales and
launching BFG’s telemarketing department.

When Michelin acquired BFG in 1995, he bowed out, turning full-time to a more low-paced printing business
that he already had started with wife, Tia. The stress of corporate life was just too much, he said, and he was
glad to go. He could turn more attention to his family, daughters Jill, Jennifer, Emily and Olivia, all of whom have
college degrees and are happily married or about to be. Theirs was a blended family. Bob had sole custody of
two daughters from his first marriage and had two more with Tia.

The couple had a rather glamorous plan: To retire when the youngest daughter went to college and move to Lake Tahoe to be ski instruc-
tors. In 2013, they did just that. But the good life was cut short when Tia was diagnosed with stomach cancer in 2015 and given only six
months to live. She lived almost six months to the day. Bob moved to a house in Sanford, N.C.,that is owned by daughter, Jennifer, and her
husband, who live in Biloxi, Miss. But more bad news followed in 2017, when Bob was diagnosed with stomach and esophageal cancer and
given only six months to live. (“What are the chances that Tia and I would be diagnosed with virtually the same thing?” he said.)

Bob credits the Duke University Medical Center with keeping his cancer at bay for much of the last four years. He says staff has called him a
“rock star” for his rugged determination to beat the odds. He’s proud that he’s never asked for a wheelchair to haul him from the hospital
parking lot to the building. But all that success came at a price: A total of 600 hours of chemotherapy and 29 radiation treatments. Surgeons
removed half of his stomach and most of his esophagus. His weight plummeted from a high of 211 pounds to a low of 128, although he’s
now at a respectable 164. The chemotherapy robbed his teeth of calcium and he had to have many removed, but the Duke Foundation
stepped forward to provide free dental work, he said. More bad news followed in January: The cancer has returned, and Bob has been put
on immunotherapy and chemotherapy pills. The treatments rob him of energy, but he expects that they will be done in June. He will be at
the Class of ’70 reunion and at a similar get-together in Akron of former BFG staffers. He is boundlessly optimistic that his good fortune will
hold.“You’ve got to believe and you’ve got to want to be here,” he said. “Everything I do has been for my daughters. The future looks
great.”

Jane Guiltinan

Jane Guiltinan was volunteering at a medical tent at a music festival at Yosemite National Park when someone
mentioned naturopathic medicine. That 1981 encounter was the beginning. She returned to San Francisco,
visited the local library (this was before the internet) and searched the card catalog (again, before the internet)
to learn what she could about the field. The rest is, as they say, history. Today Jane is a retired naturopathic
physician and dean of the School of Naturopathic Medicine at Bastyr University in Kenmore, Wash. She also was
the first co-medical director for the King County Naturopathic Medical Center, the first publicly funded clinic of
its kind nationwide, and she served on an advisory board for the National Institutes of Health.

It has not always been a smooth path. After she earned a degree in medical technology from Ohio State and
moved to the West Coast, she spent several years working in labs in a hospital and clinic, getting bored along the
way. She began to think that traditional medicine was just patching people up. After her epiphany at Yosemite,
she earned a degree from Bastyr to learn about natural healing arts like living more healthfully using dietary
supplements, meditation and more. She taught and rose through the ranks to lead the school for eight years.
Not everyone approves of the naturopathic approach, of course. When Jane was named to the board of trustees at the Harborview Medical
Center in Seattle, nurses and physicians rose up to oppose a “quack” – Jane’s word – joining their midst.

Jane gradually convinced them that she did not believe in casting spells or conjuring up spirits. She said that nurses and doctors eventually
began to pull her aside to ask for advice on this sore hip or that sinus headache. And she was reappointed to the board two more times,
bringing her total tenure to 12 years.

But all that is behind her now. Jane and her partner, fellow naturopathic physician Cindy Breed, have retired to the small seaside community
th
of Port Townsend in Washington, where they celebrated their 30 anniversary this month. They spend their time crabbing, shrimping,
kayaking and hiking and relaxing on their 25-foot power boat. “I have had a blessed life,” she said. Her only regret? That she worked so hard
that she sometimes didn’t stop to smell the proverbial roses.“I should have spent more time with a student who got a bad grade or col-
league who got a poor performance review,” she said. “I should have looked up. The work will keep.” Jane will be at the reunion and she is
prepared to talk naturopathic medicine 24/7, offering a little advice along the way.

Ken Nixon

If you’re looking for a house sitter, consider MHS classmate Ken Nixon. But to get him, it’s best if you live in
Thailand or Morocco or someplace else exotic. In the last three years, Ken and his wife, Mary, have made a
retirement lifestyle out of house sitting, completing more than 50 assignments in 12 countries on four
continents, caring for pets, farm animals, alpacas, deer and even a wallaby. “We get to live just like a local
and become a part of the community, often settling in to areas where tourists don’t go,” Ken said. “We join
a gym wherever we go and like to go to pubs because the people are often friendly and we get to see what
they like to do. It’s pretty much of a normal life except that we are always on the move.”
Continued….