James McNabney—“Mac” to his friends and acquaintances—was himself born in Nevada in 1919, one of two sons of Guy and Alexina McNabney. Guy McNabney had been born in Indiana late in the 19^th Century, and by the 1920s, he was living and working in Lovelock, a small town on the rail line about 100 miles northeast of Reno. Lovelock was farming and ranching country, and it appears that Guy McNabney was engaged in one of those occupations; the only public mention of Guy came in the Nevada Appeal newspaper in 1922, when the railroad proposed to end its stops at Lovelock, which prompted Guy to protest—losing the rail stop would have been death to any agricultural enterprise.

Guy’s son James—“Mac”—was a handsome young man, considered very bright by all his schoolmates, and also a gifted athlete, running the sprints and hurdles. By 1943 he was in military service, as were most able-bodied young men in the first years of World War II. On May 10 of that year he married Marie Williams in San Francisco; Marie was the daughter of the superintendent of a gold mine in Tonopah, Nevada, Laurence Williams, and his wife Frances. Eventually Frances Williams—who would be known to Larry and his older brother Jimmy as “Gamm,” or “Gammy”—would as a widow marry a man named Laughenour; by the time “Gammy” died in 1980, she would leave an estate worth about a half a million dollars.

“Mac” McNabney returned from the war to Reno, and began to raise a family. Larry’s brother James, Jr.—“Jimmy”—was born in 1947, and Laurence Williams McNabney—“Larry”—came at the end of the following year. Then, while both boys were still toddlers, Mac was recalled to the service for the Korean War.

The details of this call-up and its effects on the McNabney family are sketchy, but it appears that the conflict in Korea had a profound effect on Mac. Some people in Reno were later to say, in fact, that on his return to Reno after the Korean War, Mac was never the same person that he had been before being recalled to service. Clearly, Mac had a number of problems, not the least of which was his drinking. In short, Mac was an alcoholic.

Alcoholism is an insidious disease, not least because it creeps up so unobtrusively on its victim. This is because the tolerance for the drug grows with habitual usage. Where a young soldier like Mac might be able to polish off a six-pack of beers without much effect, a middle-aged Mac would find himself drinking more and more alcohol, and having a far harder time stopping—in short, it took more booze for Mac to feel its influence.

The alcoholic has two burdens that the non-alcoholic doesn’t have: first, a probable genetic condition which causes alcohol to affect the body and brain chemistry more powerfully than it does the non-alcoholic’s; and second, a social/psychological condition which helps create a craving for the drug as an inseparable part of the personality of the afflicted person. A person with the genetic condition who does not have the psycho/social condition is not likely to become an alcoholic; nor is a person with the psycho/social condition who does not also have the genetic condition. The combination of the two conditions in an individual creates a powerful, often overwhelming dynamic. As a general rule, the only way the dynamic can be shattered is to disrupt the psycho/social condition that leads to the consumption of alcohol and replace it with something else, which is how such programs as Alcoholics Anonymous and similar “rehab” programs essentially function. Once the psycho/social condition is altered, it may be possible for an alcoholic to realize that they have the underlying genetic condition as well, but until the psycho/social condition is addressed, this is information that isn’t particularly useful to the sufferer of alcoholism.

Because of its progressive nature—that is, it increases in severity over a period of years—it is often difficult for a person who is an alcoholic to even realize his condition. In effect, there is a gradual erosion of personality, often so subtle that it passes unnoticed, even by people who are closest to the afflicted person. This seems to have been the case with Mac. People who knew him later observed that he was great fun, the life of the party—particularly among all the rest of the drinkers. But at home he was a terror—stern, demanding, unforgiving of his wife and two sons.

Outwardly—that is to say, materially—the McNabney family seemed comfortable. Mac had a job managing the University of Nevada bookstore, and the family lived in a very nice house on Brown Street in southwest Reno. The family had two cars, an investment portfolio, a membership in a country club. On the surface, then, things seemed fine. But underneath there were severe troubles. This environment was to have profound, perhaps fatal consequences later for both Larry and his brother Jimmy. Larry, for one, was to have a life-long difficulty with intimacy—he would be married five times—and he would never be able to define himself in terms other than what he had—material things—or what he did: his image to others. These are both conditions that stemmed from the troubled, distant relationship with his father.

Both Jimmy and Larry attended Reno public schools, at Mt. Rose Elementary and later Reno High School. Mac was a stern taskmaster; those who knew the family recalled that he demanded both academic and athletic excellence from his sons. Mac himself had been a prize-winning athlete in high school, and Jimmy and Larry felt driven to measure up to Mac’s expectations.

In Larry’s senior year he met another senior from a cross-town high school, Donna Pagini; unlike Larry, Donna was from a large, boisterous, loving family. Larry and Donna began dating, and by the time they graduated in 1966, were engaged to be married. This, it seems, was evidence of a rebellion against Mac. Neither family approved of the other, and certainly not of the proposed marriage. Donna’s father thought little of Larry—he seemed pretty stuck-up, at least to the Paginis—stiff, taciturn almost to the point of rudeness. And Mac disliked Donna—she was the cause of Larry’s rebellion. To Donna, Mac was simply intimidating. “I was scared to death of him,” she said, years later.

After leaving high school, Larry enrolled at the University of Nevada, Reno; Donna recalled that he majored in business. At the end of the first year, Donna and Larry were married. That at least got Larry out from under Mac’s often baleful presence. By the year after that, Donna was pregnant; in July of 1968, she Donna gave birth to a daughter, Cristin.

As the 1960s came to a close, Donna realized that she had probably made a mistake in marrying Larry. He seemed very uncomfortable around her family, with its spontaneity and loving laughter. As long as she was in Reno, Donna could fall back on her family when things with Larry got rough. And things did get rough from time to time; just like his father, Larry had begun to drink, and when he drank, he could be belligerent and aggressive, and often insulting when not condescending. Donna didn’t like it.

After graduating from UNR in 1970, Larry was accepted as a student at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento, California, affiliated with the University of the Pacific. In August of that year, Larry and Donna moved to Sacramento so Larry could get ready to attend classes. Donna hated it.

“By that time I knew it wasn’t going to work,” she said later. “And I missed my family.” After several weeks, Donna moved back to Reno, taking Cristin with her. She filed for divorce from Larry that month, and six weeks later, on September 22, the divorce was granted.

At this point there appears to be some imprecision in Larry’s activities, one that is not clarified by the available records. Donna recalled later that as a member of the UNR Reserve Officers Training Command [the ROTC], Larry had an obligation to fulfill in terms of military service. This was during the war in Viet Nam, of course, and exemptions from such service were growing increasingly rare. Donna today recalls that after she and Larry divorced, he went into the Army, traveling to Fort Benning in Georgia; and indeed, several of Larry’s friends recall much the same. It appears, therefore, that despite his acceptance in law school, Larry did not actually enroll; or if he did, he dropped out after the divorce and decided to fulfill his military obligation.

But events were soon to overtake Larry, and horrific events they were to be.