×
X logo

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox.

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)

You may opt-out anytime by clicking "unsubscribe" from the newsletter or from your account.

World War II Veteran Follows Betty Zane’s Footprints

WWII Veteran Fulfills Dream By Walking In Heroine’s Footsteps

Photos by Scott McCloskey Above: Howard Worley, 93, of Oregon, fulfills a dream by visiting Wheeling, one of the sites associated with Revolutionary War heroine Betty Zane. With him is his daughter, Rebecca Demarino.

WHEELING — A World War II veteran from Oregon became so enamored with the story of Revolutionary War heroine Betty Zane that he made the nearly 3,000-mile trip to Wheeling and Martins Ferry to see the same landscapes the legendary Zane took more than 200 years ago.

Howard Worley, 93, a retired Navy lieutenant commander from Monmouth, Ore., was inspired by a novel he read about Betty Zane some time ago. So his daughter, Rebecca Demarino, and her husband Tom of Yacolt, Wash., decided to give him the chance to fulfill his dream by visiting the area last week.

According to Demarino, Worley retired from the military to a 100-acre ranch in 1965 and became immensely fascinated while reading the novel “Betty Zane,” written by Zane Grey. She said her father read several novels by Grey, who was the great-grandnephew of Betty Zane and best known for his fiction novels about the American frontier during the early 20th century.

The novel “Betty Zane” tells the story of the events culminating in the last battle of the American Revolution, during which Betty Zane became known for her heroic actions in volunteering to retrieve additional supplies from her brother’s nearby home. Her bravery and act of heroism furthered the cause of the Revolution by protecting Fort Henry and proving that women contributed to it, as well, according to the National Women’s History Museum website.

“We brought him out here to see as much about Betty Zane as we can,” Demarino said. “He became fascinated with the story and started researching online every aspect of Betty Zane’s life that he could and he found out there was a plaque in Wheeling where her house had been and he read about Fort Henry and learned that there was a monument near her grave in Martins Ferry. … There was something about her courage and she was so young … that something grabbed him about her character and he wanted to know more about the real Betty Zane.”

Demarino said after her mother passed away in 2005, her father kept busy with his ranch duties, taking care of horses and building fences until 2010 when he began to encounter health problems. She said prior to suffering a stroke, her father began working on his own “Western romance” novel.

“He recovered pretty well, and he has always been an avid reader, so he began reading quite a bit,” Demarino said, noting it was during this time she helped him type the last four chapters of his book, “The Stage Coach Murders.” She said his book was eventually published at the end of 2012 through Create Space.

It was following the completion of his book that he became consumed with the Betty Zane novel.

“He read the novel ‘Betty Zane’ like 10 times, and he learned so much about her. Then one day, like two weeks ago, he said to me that he wanted to come out to Wheeling and see the plaque and see her grave in Martins Ferry and the monument there,” said Demarino. “And it just kind of blew myself and my siblings away because the only thing he travels for nowadays is to church and any doctor’s appointment he might have.

“He liked the fact that she was a real person. … He read the author’s notes, where Zane Grey told about her being his ancestor, and that she was a real person and that Fort Henry existed,” she continued.

So over a two-day period last week they decided to make the cross-country flight and visit the area from what Demarino called a “Betty Zane viewpoint.”

“He told me today that he is much more interested in her real life than the novel,” she said. “We drove down by the (Ohio) River. … He sat there in the car and he gazed out at the river and he said, ‘She saw this same river. … It just moves him and he feels a connection to the past. … You get where she stood and what she looked at and time just melts away like it was yesterday. He was really so moved and had a sense of being here in the moment where she had been.

“She might have come down here to possibly wash some clothes, or haul some water or fish,” Demarino said to her father, as they gazed out over the riverbank.

NEWSLETTER

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *

COMMENTS

[vivafbcomment]

Starting at $4.73/week.

Subscribe Today