|
|
|
HOUSTON CHRONICLE ARCHIVES
Paper: Houston Chronicle
Date: WED 12/08/1999 Section: A Page: 20 Edition: 3 STAR
`Silver Taps' honors Aggie Bonfire victims /Thousands gather at somber campus ritual COLLEGE STATION - Every light around them darkened, thousands of Aggies gathered on the Texas A&M campus Tuesday night for a monthly tradition, given new meaning by the recent deaths of 12 Bonfire workers. The chimes at Albritton Tower pealed at 10:15 p.m., as they do the first Tuesday of every month. Twenty-five minutes later, the Ross Volunteers, all members of the Corps of Cadets, fired a 21-gun salute. Then, five trumpeters played Taps three times - once in every direction except east - because the sun will never again rise on the fallen Aggies. "Silver Taps" serves as a remembrance of Aggies who die while still attending the tradition-steeped school. The ceremony has been held each month this semester, which has been marred by a string of tragedies, including a September plane crash that killed five people and the car crash that killed six young people, including A&M student Robert Hart Daniel, a freshman computer engineering major. "This is the true Aggie service," said Tom Lytle, a former student from Houston. Students, family and friends - as many as 50,000 by some estimates - began crowding into the center of the campus at 9:30 p.m. on a cold, blustery night for December's Silver Taps. This month's ceremony was especially poignant because of the deaths of 11 students and one former student in the collapse of the Bonfire timber stack on Nov. 18. The names of the fallen Aggies - lost in the worst disaster in the school's 123-year history - are inscribed on the hearts of many Aggies nationwide. They are: Miranda Denise Adams, Michael Stephen Ebanks, Jeremy Richard Frampton, Jamie Lynn Hand, Christopher Lee Heard, Timothy Doran Kerlee, Lucas John Kimmel, Bryan Allan McClain, Chad Anthony Powell, Jerry Don Self and Nathan Scott West. A former student killed in the Bonfire accident, 1997 graduate Christopher Breen of Austin, will be honored in April during Muster. Another 27 students were injured. One of them, John Comstock of Richardson, remains hospitalized in serious condition. "Tonight marks the final goodbye to classmates and friends," said Michele Wilson, a 34-year-old senior from Michigan who knew two of the 12 students who died in the collapse. "It's a chance to give them the honor and respect they deserve." Silver Taps originated as part of a memorial for Lawrence Sullivan Ross, an A&M president who died in office. The ceremony is traditionally held in front of a statue of Ross at the center of campus. Standing guard by the statue Tuesday night were the "senior boots" delivered to the Bartless, Tenn., address of Tim Kerlee the day after he died. Two cadets stood by the boots, an honor among seniors in the Corps. Even in normal times, Aggies show profound respect for their dead, both in the monthly Silver Taps ceremony and in Muster, an annual remembrance held every spring. "Silver Taps is the second most intimate time," behind Muster, Wilson said. Wilson, who has attended four different universities, said she has never seen a school where the students pull together as they do at A&M. And it has become even closer since Nov. 18. "It's the first time at a public university that I've heard of people just stopping and praying in class," she said. "It really brings people together. It's no longer uncool to pray."
Copyright notice: All materials in this archive are copyrighted by Houston
Chronicle Publishing Company Division, Hearst Newspapers Partnership, L.P., or its news and feature
syndicates and wire services. No materials may be directly or indirectly published, posted to Internet
and intranet distribution channels, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed
in any medium. Neither these materials nor any portion thereof may be stored in a computer except for
personal and non-commercial use. |
|