Guy From Utah Defends a Friend; Not Forgotten Years Later

    Guy From Utah Defends a Friend; Not Forgotten Years Later

     Some people live long lives and leave their legacies. And, there are those that record their lives in books, films, photographs, and other somewhat lasting ways. Many leave their evidence of impact, of lives lived, decisions made. Some should be remembered more, while countless millions are forgotten in the "sands of time." So the expression goes.

     In the latter centuries of human existence people tend to leave more traces of their lives. They leave children, work, programs, impacts in small and large ways. Some things that they do leave a lasting imprint on the earth. And it is recorded.

Other imprints, left behind by some people, are harder to measure. Perhaps those imprints have little meaning, especially when forgotten.

However, there are people who do something, leave something, that in effect may have seemed to have no residual trace, and yet: there are those that remember, and perhaps the recollection of them and their life, their impact though seemingly futile, makes a difference beyond their finite presence in the world. This is why someone like me writes about them.

     This guy, I will call him Stephen*, was from Utah. He was probably born in the early 1970s, like me.

     Where many young men (and women) from Utah grew up in a faith that sends them across the world in different paths of spreading their faith and endeavor for the church organization, which is a large influence there, Stephen did not follow in that way. He went for a more individual approach, seemingly, teaching English in Taiwan, I believe, as one of his sisters had done. Maybe they were there together on that distant island, I cannot recall. Somehow he chose to matriculate to Indiana University. I am not sure why, or how that was decided. Like so many people over the decades and years, he became a student at this large state school, somewhat anonymous to the greater world, perhaps aspiring to greater things.

    Students do not need fame nor fortune, notoriety nor outstanding achievement in order to succeed and become who they should be. I never met Stephen, I only learned about him from a few who knew him, plus a couple of articles by journalists who reported on him. He was heroic; it was tragic how he left the earth, and the fight for his memory is now at play.

    Stephen was friends with a young lady who apparently was either from or living in California when she met and knew another young man, who I also never knew, but I shall call him Wolfgang*. He was German. I cannot recall how long he had lived in the United States, or how well he knew this young lady when he met her in the West.

     Somehow Wolfgang decided to cross the country to see this young woman; perhaps she had come to Indiana in part to escape her past, or at least be away from this person. I don't know the details, others still living undoubtedly do know. Maybe there was a restraining order, maybe some police and officials knew of the threat on the West Coast. Maybe the Herald Telephone, the Bloomington local paper, reported it; maybe a California paper did, too.

   Wolfgang arrived in Bloomington seeking her out; he had brought weapons. This was 1992, the spring had come to the lower Mid West and it was warm. There may have been leaves on the trees. Things seemed fine in this small college town. The country was going through presidential primaries, Jerry Brown had come to campus and the riots of LA, while disturbing, were far away.

    Bad things with guns don't happen in Bloomington, it is a safe place. That is what most people who have lived there will tell you. I lived there many years, never felt threatened with guns. My parents and siblings have lived there more; never had problems.

   Foreigners from far lands do not come to harm those in Monroe County. But one did, and Stephen was there to make his contribution in this incident. Wolfgang made his cross country sojourn, found the young lady at a student dormitory for many foreign students called Eigamenn Hall; Stephen got into a confrontation with Wolfgang, apparently because the German threatened violence or danger. Stephen put the German in a hold, but when a third party came along, not knowing the situation, the third party (male) released Wolfgang from the clutches of Stephen. The confusion of the moment reigned, I imagine.

    From there, Wolfgang was able to grab his hand weapon (not sure what type), shoot Stephen, shoot the girl, and then walked outside the student hall and shot himself.
   A double homicide-suicide. Three lives ended, much too soon. They all were young, some people live beyond the three's combined age.

    I did not know about Stephen at this time, I had never met him as far as I knew, among the 40,000 other Indiana University students in and around campus. But, because of his Church membership, the full time missionaries were called in action to go to the local hospital and potentially give him a life saving blessing. The elders, our full time missionaries, contacted me to drive them there. So I did.

    In this process I learned that a young man from Utah was tragically shot and the doctors were attending to him at the Bloomington Hospital, while his parents were flying from Utah as fast as possible. When the elders entered the hospital they were told that Stephen was being treated by doctors and I do not think that they ever reached him, alive or dead.

    Stephen did not survive. His friend from California did not live. The German shooter was no more.

    Survivors of mostly Stephen, that I understand, gathered in the commons lounge of Eigemenn Hall and gave him tribute. His parents were there, many of my church friends were there. My good friend Ralph knew Stephen, and he was there. Very somber occasion, and a violin solo solemnified it, words were spoken.

   The local paper dug into Stephen's life, of how his religion teacher was so impresses by what Stephen had written about Abraham. He was a well regarded student, a well regarded human being.

   A Utah guy lost in Indiana, and missed by many.

  And now, almost forgotten.

   However, his bravery and life, at least for a few survivors, will live on.

  And so we remember and write, record and reflect. And his life has more meaning--  perhaps all of our lives do have more meaning, because of that. Because he acted, he defended, he was not immediately successful in his attempt at heroism, also known as natural decency, but he is still alive to those who knew him.

   And to those like me, who did not know him, he is alive as well.

   Decency and kindness, bravery and courage, do not die. We remember those things, those people.