Free Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family by Robert Kolker Page B

posh Broadmoor Hotel with a turban on his head and a live, short-winged goshawk in his left hand. He told everyone he was dressed as an ancient seer or mystic. That got his picture in the paper.
    Mimi smiled alongside him. She had her own notoriety, thanks to the children. The Rocky Mountain News published Mimi’s recipe for lamb curry, seasoned with onion and apple and garlic and served with boiled rice and green beans, slivered almonds and artichoke hearts. The headline: SHE SERVES EXOTIC FOODS TO FAMILY OF NINE BOYS .
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    WHEN HE WASN’T parachuting out of C-47s with the Air Explorer Scouts or studying classical guitar or practicing judo or playing hockey or rappelling down cliffs with his father, the Galvins’ oldest son, Donald, was a track star and all-state guard and tackle on the Air Academy High School football team—number 77. Going to his games was often the big family outing of the week. In his senior year, Donald took state in his weight class in wrestling, his team took the state title in football, and he was dating a cheerleader whose father happened to be his father’s boss, the Air Force general in charge of the Academy. Donald was, by many measures, his father’s son—handsome, athletic, popular—and to his brothers he was a hard act to follow.
    He was also, in ways that Don and Mimi either missed or chose to overlook, not precisely what they assumed him to be. Donald was quieter than Don had been in high school, and despite everything he did on the ball fields he was not the sort of person who got elected class president. His grades were average, eventually earning him a spot at Colorado State, not the more selective University of Colorado. And while he looked the part of his father, the carefree charmer, he lacked the charisma to pull it off. From the time he was a teenager, it was as if there was something keeping Donald from connecting with the world in a conventional way. He seemed most at home, at ease with himself, climbing and rappelling from cliffs and raiding aeries in the great outdoors. But whatever sense of mastery Donald demonstrated out in nature didn’t play as well around people.
    At home, Donald exercised supreme authority over his younger brothers—first as a sort of substitute parent, and then as something less wholesome. When his parents weren’t around, he became, by turns, a mischief-maker, a bully, and an instigator of chaos. It would start out innocently enough, before escalating in ways that some of his brothers found terrifying. Don and Mimi would go out—Don training with the falconry cadets, or picking up an extra class to teach at one of the local colleges, or studying for his PhD; Mimi volunteering with the opera—and Donald, the oldest, would have to baby-sit, which he would not want to do. To divert himself, he’d goof around with his brothers: “Open your mouth, and close your eyes, and I’ll give you a big surprise,” followed by a mouthful of whipped cream.
    Then the games would change. Donald would pound his brothers on their arms, right on the muscle, where it hurt the most. And then he would start staging fights. Michael against Richard, Richard against Joseph. He’d have two brothers hold a third one down while he took swings at him, then tell the others to take their own turn on the defenseless, captive brother. The command, to some of his younger brothers, was unforgettable: “If you don’t hit him and hit him hard, you’re going to be up there next.”
    At first, all this seemed to happen without Don and Mimi doing much of anything about it. It wasn’t that they weren’t told—it was that they couldn’t believe Donald was capable of the things his brothers accused him of doing. “I begged my parents not to leave him there when I was home,” said John—the third son, four years younger than Donald. “Donald, I think, was my father’s favorite. He’d take Donald’s word over anybody’s. In the meantime, I had to go find a place