Bitter Blood (78 page)

At five, Susie Newsom reigned as Queen of the May, but her temper tantrums were so bad that her mother tried to deal with them by putting her under cold showers. (
Photo by Coppedge
.)

Susie posed for a photo layout of fraternity sweethearts at Wake Forest University, where she met Tom Lynch. INSERT: Yearbook photo of Susie as a graduate student at Wake Forest, while she waited for Tom to receive his degree.

LEFT: Tom Lynch, number 21, on the Wake Forest basketball team. His best friend, Jerry Montgomery, number 11, was team captain. RIGHT: Tom’s yearbook photo at Wake Forest in 1969, when he was a junior.

Tom and Susie’s wedding proceeded with great tension because of bickering between Susie and Delores. But both families posed amicably afterward. Left to right: Florence Newsom, Bob Newsom, Delores Lynch, Chuck Lynch, Susie, Tom, Susie’s cousins, Nancy Dunn and Mary Ann Klenner Palmer, and Janie Lynch.

LEFT: Susie with her Aunt Su-Su at her wedding. RIGHT: Susie poses with Tom’s parents, Delores and Chuck. Later she would refuse to visit them.

Dr. Frederick R. Klenner and his wife, Annie Hill Sharp Klenner. Their marriage greatly disturbed the Sharp family. (
Photo by Richard T. Davis, courtesy of Greensboro News & Record.
)

RIGHT: Dr. Klenner was a pioneer of vitamin treatments, particularly vitamin C, his cure-all. He was internationally recognized for his work and considered a genius by some. Patients flocked to his run-down clinic in Reidsville, North Carolina, in hope of miraculous cures. (
Photo by Dave Nicholson, courtesy of Greensboro News & Record.
) LEFT: Entrance to Dr. Klenner’s clinic. (
Photo by Dave Nicholson, courtesy of Greensboro News & Record.
)

LEFT: Frederick R. Klenner, Jr., was called Fritz from childhood. His father sent him to a private academy in Atlanta to escape racial integration in his senior year of high school. (
Courtesy of Greensboro News & Record.
) RIGHT: At Reidsville High School, where he was in the Library Club, Fritz, second from right in back row, was thought to be a nerd. He wore military attire to school, worshipped guns, and spoke favorably of the Ku Klux Klan and Adolf Hitler. His best friend, Randy Clark, peers over his shoulder.

LEFT: Fritz’s life was mapped out for him by his father, who dreamed that his son would take over his important work. Father and son worked together at the clinic while family members and patients were led to believe Fritz was a medical student at Duke University. (Courtesy of
Greensboro News & Record.
) RIGHT: Fritz’s worship for his father and his deep need to please him led to a secret life that grew more and more bizarre. (
Photo by Richard T. Davis, courtesy of
Greensboro News & Record.)

LEFT: Tom Lynch had to go to court to see his sons. At Christmas 1983, he and his new wife, Kathy, had a happy reunion with Jim, front, and John. RIGHT: Delores rarely got to see her only grandchildren. She wasn’t a typical grandmother. She was happy to see John and Jim, but she was happy when they left, too. They had visited her and her dogs in the big house on Covered Bridge Road in the summer of 1983.