Granddaughter’s fight against cancer inspires Traverso family to work to raise awareness

The Traverso family is the closest thing to royalty here in northern Sonoma County.

For decades, from 1932 to 2011, the family owned and operated a popular market and wine store, the eponymous Traverso’s Gourmet Foods Wines in Santa Rosa.

“I bought the things that make life here in Sonoma County great: the Ig Vella dry jack and the extra-sharp New York cheddar, the wine Bill (Traverso) says is the best of the week, the ravioli made that morning in San Francisco, the olive oil tailored to my cooking, the bags of polenta, the Christmas and Easter panettoni, the precious bottle of Germain Robin brandy my husband makes every birthday, and about a thousand slices of salami, handed over at the counter, just for tasting,” Gaye LeBaron wrote in her 2009 column about Traverso’s move from downtown Santa Rosa.

Most recently, one of the patriarchs, Bill Traverso, served as an adjunct professor in the wine studies program at Santa Rosa Junior College, teaching courses on the wines of Italy, professional wine judgment, marketing and sales.

Today, several members of the Traverso family have taken on a new role: advocates for pediatric cancer awareness.

This most recent development was inspired by Harper Thair, Bill’s granddaughter.

Five years ago, at age three, Harper was diagnosed with leukemia. She battled the disease and went into remission. Since then, Stephanie Thair, Harper’s mother and a Montgomery High School graduate, has dedicated her life to helping other families facing similar challenges, partnering with the MaxLove Project, a Southern California-based nonprofit, to maximize the impact of the effort. Bill himself has also gotten involved.

According to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, approximately 456,481 people are living with or in remission from leukemia in the United States.

This partnership is especially relevant now, given that September is both Blood Cancer Awareness Month and Pediatric Cancer Awareness Month nationwide.

“My granddaughter has been through a lot,” Bill said. “The least we can do is give back to her.”

A Parent’s Worst Nightmare

Harper’s story is poignant. It was 2019. Harper, Stephanie, and the rest of the Thair family were supposed to fly from their home in Orange County to Santa Rosa for Easter, but something was off about Harper. She was pale and her energy level was off.

Stephanie took her daughter to a hospital in Mission Viejo, where doctors discovered Harper had extremely low hemoglobin.

They immediately sent her to Children’s Hospital of Orange County.

After several rounds of testing, doctors suspected Harper had leukemia. Her situation was particularly difficult: Doctors diagnosed bone marrow failure and told Stephanie that her daughter would need a transplant as soon as possible. The news was especially difficult because Stephanie had lost her mother, Bill’s wife, to an unrelated blood cancer three years earlier.

“We were all in shock,” Stephanie said. “It was a terrible time.”

Eventually, doctors diagnosed him with acute myeloid leukemia, which required four rounds of chemotherapy before anything else could be done.

Fortunately, once Harper’s condition stabilized, doctors identified a bone marrow donor who flew from Utah to donate the bone marrow Harper needed to survive. On September 26, 2019, she received her transplant.

The recovery was tough. In total, Harper was in the hospital for more than 100 days and received 38 platelet and blood transfusions. It was also isolating. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, the entire Thair family had to isolate in their Rancho Santa Margarita home to make sure Harper avoided germs her weakened immune system couldn’t fight off.

“When your own child is alive because of the donation of others, your perspective changes completely,” Stephanie said. “From that day on, I vowed to give back and live my life to help other people and other families.”

She added: “I like to be inconspicuous, I don’t like to attract too much attention. But when it comes to that, I’m all in.”

Motivated to make a difference

For Stephanie, giving back meant volunteering with the National Marrow Donor Program, a nonprofit formerly known as Be the Match. After Harper was released from treatment, Stephanie also reached out to the MaxLove Project.

Stephanie heard about the organization through a brochure she received while Harper was in the hospital. The MaxLove Project was founded by Audra DiPadova Wilford in honor of her son Max, who was diagnosed with brain cancer at age 4. The nonprofit’s mission is to improve the quality of life for families facing childhood cancers, rare pediatric diseases, and chronic hospitalizations through evidence-based culinary medicine, integrative care, and emotional health.