Tinley Loved Ones Remember Train Crash Victims; Deny the Oak Forest Accident Was a Suicide

Gail Crabtree, 97, and Donna Grace, 81, were best friends. The Tinley Park women were "happy, healthy, Christian women," Crabtree's granddaughter, Gayle Larsen, said Friday.

She said she can't quite understand what happened Thursday when Crabtree was . Both women died on impact. Officials confirmed Friday that Grace was driving the car.

Larsen vehemently denied rumblings that a note Grace left pointed toward suicide.

"It absolutely was not a suicide note," said Larsen, 61, who lived with Crabtree at her longtime home on South New England Avenue. "I have answered two calls from (Gail's) great-grandchildren who were in tears when they had heard on the news that this was a supposed suicide. … That's not what it was."

Larsen said the note, which she alleges was written to Grace's son, was "chiding him" and "calling him to task."

"I think if that note meant anything, I think it meant that she finally decided that if he didn't shape up, he could ship out," she said. "They're saying it was a goodbye note? No. Not unless he was leaving the house."

Grace’s son, Steve Grace Jr., said when the sheriff's police searched the home—where his mother also lived—they didn't mention finding a note. Officials from the Cook County Sheriff's Office did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment on Friday afternoon. 

"I don't understand," Steve Grace said. "Investigators are working through everything to figure out what happened." 

Both Grace and Larsen described the two women similarly—close to God. They met more than 20 years ago at Heritage Baptist Church in Frankfort, where they attended services multiple times a week.

Every Thursday, they played dominos with their friends at a senior center in Crestwood. That's where the two were coming back from this week when they collided with the train, Larsen said. .  

"They had a lot of close friends," she said. "Donna was upbeat. She likes to clean people's houses and helps people all the time."

Both women were spry in their old age. Crabtree walked with a cane, but was in good health, and would often spend time pulling weeds in her front yard.

Her 97th birthday was a week ago this Saturday, when she told Larsen she wanted to live to be her mother's age when she died—102.

She hopes Crabtree is remembered just as she was.

"As someone who loved her family and loved life and wouldn't give it up for nothin'," she said.