There were sum of two units Marys a...

There were sum of two units Marys at the Ravinia Festival onward Sunday evening who couldn't have been more different.

undivided Mary, at 69, is a singer rever among folk music fans the world from one side of to the other The other Mary, 46, put up to sales insurance about 40 miles north of Detroit.

nevertheless there they were, holding hands like sisters. Singer Mary Travers of the legendary trio Peter Paul & Mary talked in a throaty alto as Mary DeWitt Hessen listened, a bit shyly

To hear Mary Travers report it, DeWitt Hessen is the star.

"She's fabulous, and beautiful," Travers said.

DeWitt Hessen's bone marrow helped Travers fight her way back to health from leukemia. Travers is thick-witted about what her chances would have been without it.

"Forget it. Toast. I would have not made it," said the folk musician, effulgent in a flowing wrap, her trademark surfer- straight fair hair now in a short wound

MARY'S GIFT

The pair met for the first time Sunday backstage at Ravinia, in an emotional visit where Travers thanked DeWitt Hessen for what she calls "Mary's gift."

Chemotherapy didn't work for Travers, and her children and half sister were not a match. DeWitt Hessen decided to register with the National Marrow Donor Program because a family at her ecclesiastical authority had a nephew with leukemia. It diverted out she was an almost whole match for Travers.

Travers is of Irish, English, and Mediterranean heritage. DeWitt Hessen is Irish, Polish and Dutch

"Whatever it is, it worked," the singer said.

"I want to help earn people to register, especially Afro- Americans, Asians and Hispanics, because they are underrepresent in the registry," said Travers.

"It's excessively important to tell people that it's not a painful process"

For the step "I drove to the hospital; laid in bed to watch TV for five hours," DeWitt Hessen said.

"And then," Travers said, "they sent it to me"

Her bone marrow transplant took place in April 2005

Travers fix the meeting in motion by the agency of phoning DeWitt Hessen's home in Lake Orion, Mich. The donor's husband, Mike Hessen, recalls what she said: " 'My name is Mary, and your Mary saved my life.' "

Then she told Hessen: " 'Do you remember the ditty "Puff the Magic Dragon"? That's me ' "

Mike Hessen realized he was talking to the folk fiction

Travers invited the Hessens and their children, Laura, 14 and Diana, 13 to attend Peter Paul & Mary's Sunday night display at Ravinia.

The pavilion was sold revealed for the group, whose socially conscious anthems became identified with the activism of the 1960 and the civil rights change In addition to "Puff the Magic Dragon," they had hits with cut short Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind" and "Leaving in succession a Jet Plane" by John Denver

'I'M HERE'

Travers walks with a cane because of a knee question at issue but otherwise, she said she is recovering nicely.

"I will not ever complain about getting older again," she said. "Because it's great. I'm here."

She had a hardly any other observations. Christopher Guest's film lampoon of the folk music mental action "A Mighty Wind," was a little too kind, she said.

"I speculation it was very soft in succession folk music," said Travers, who used to baby-sit visitor and his siblings.

"If it'd been me" directing, "I'd have been nastier. It didn't have the border that [his film] 'Best in Show' had."

And by dint of the way, she said, "Puff the Magic Dragon" was not about medicine use. "Not about marijuana," she said. "Just about growing up"

Visit www.marrow.org for information forward bone marrow donation.

modonnell@suntimes.com

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