Effects of aide's death still felt

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- A year after his son's death, Dale Sifford is still adjusting to the loss.

"It has been a long year for us, yet it seems like only yesterday," Sifford said. "The family has had a terrible time getting over this, but we are making it."

Chris Sifford, a longtime senior aide to Gov. Mel Carnahan, died a year ago today in the plane crash that also killed his boss and Carnahan' son, Randy.

A comfort, though, has been the outpouring of affection and respect for Chris. Dale Sifford says he had no idea of the extensive impact his son had on others.

"We didn't realize all of the things he had done," Sifford said.

As a funeral director at the family's Morgan-Sifford Funeral Home in Puxico, Mo., Sifford has been in the unusual position of being consoled by those mourning the losses of their own family members.

"At every funeral, someone I haven't seen in the past year offers their condolences and says what a fine young man he was," Sifford said.

Rising star

Chris Sifford, 37 at the time of his death, was a former print and radio journalist who began his long association with Carnahan in 1992 when he became press secretary for Carnahan's first campaign for governor. After the election, Sifford became the communications director for the governor's office. He held that post until July 1999, when he became Carnahan's chief of staff, the top administrative position in the governor's office.

He left that post a year later to work for Carnahan's campaign for the U.S. Senate. The fatal plane crash occurred while Sifford, the governor and Randy Carnahan, their pilot, were en route to a campaign event in New Madrid, Mo.

Marilyn Williams, at the time a state representative whose district included Sifford's hometown, says Sifford was a rising star in the Democratic Party, and his loss was felt not just in tiny Puxico but throughout Southeast Missouri.

"Chris always kept in touch with his roots and his friends and family," Williams said. "I don't think he ever missed a Puxico homecoming."

Sifford's success was an inspiration to young people growing up in Puxico, showing them they could accomplish anything, Williams said.

That Sifford's death wasn't treated as a footnote to the tragic loss of the state's governor was also significant, Williams says.

"I think that spoke volumes about the impact Chris had on people's lives," Williams said. "His loss wasn't any less than the governor's loss or Randy's loss."

Valued spokesman

When Sifford moved up to chief of staff, Jerry Nachtigal replaced him as the governor's spokesman. Nachtigal still holds that job today under Gov. Bob Holden.

"There is not a day that goes by in the course of my job that I don't think 'What would Chris Sifford do in this situation?'" Nachtigal said. "His judgment was so good. If I can be half the press secretary he was, I will be satisfied."

Sifford was special in that in addition to being a governor's spokesman, he was also an expert on policy, Nachtigal says. Most Missourians will never know how close the relationship was between Sifford and Carnahan and the influence the aide had on the governor, Nachtigal says.

"They were three decades apart in age, but thinkingwise they were just so aligned in their thought processes and what goals they had for the state," Nachtigal said. "Mel just trusted Chris' judgment."

mpowers@semissourian.com

(573) 635-4608