Margaret Mary Ray

Ray was the second of four children born to George and Loretta Ray in Illinois. She attended Grayslake Community High in Grayslake, Illinois where she was a popular honor student. After graduating in 1970, Ray briefly enrolled in a nursing program at Marquette University. She dropped out during her sophomore year to marry her first husband, Gary Johanson, with whom she eventually had four children. When Ray was in her early 20s, she began showing signs of schizophrenia. Two of her brothers, Bill and David, also had schizophrenia which began manifesting when both were in their early 20s. Bill committed suicide by driving his car into a tree in 1973 while David died of intentional carbon monoxide poisoning in 1977. Ray's mother, Loretta, later revealed that George Ray (who died of a heart attack in the 1970s) was treated for schizophrenia before their marriage and was an alcoholic.[1][2]

By 1982, Ray's marriage to Gary Johanson ended in divorce. Her mental health continued to decline and her ex-husband was awarded custody of their four children. Sometime after her divorce, Ray married for a second time and had a fifth child, Alex, in 1984. Ray's friends and family attempted to get her professional help, but Ray refused and would frequently disappear for months at a time. Ray lived a transient life and would often hitchhike across the United States. When she was not living at the homes of various friends and family members, she would live in shanties. Around 1989, she relinquished custody of Alex to her mother.[1][2][3]

After her stint in jail, Ray was sent to a psychiatric hospital in Miami and prescribed Haldol, an antipsychotic drug. Her condition improved and she was released from the hospital in August 1998. Shortly after her release, Ray stopped taking Haldol. She settled in Hotchkiss, Colorado, living on Social Security disability benefits and performing odd jobs.[1]

On October 5 of the same year, she committed suicide by kneeling on the tracks of the Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad in front of an oncoming train. In a letter that she wrote to her mother before her death, Ray said, "I'm all traveled out. I chose a painless and instantaneous way to end my life in the valley I loved."[2] Ray's body was cremated and her family scattered her ashes in Needle Rock Natural Area near Crawford, Colorado.[1] Musgrave publicly expressed sympathy upon her death, describing her as a "creative genius" and stating that he felt as if he had lost a relative. Letterman described her suicide as a "sad end to a confused life."[3]

• Joe Halderman