Created: Saturday, February 16, 2008 12:00 a.m. CST FONT SIZE:   Now We MournBy Kate Weber - Daily Chronicle
DeKALB - Patrick DeGeorge will always be a Huskie. Having attended Northern Illinois University from 1999-2006, DeGeorge, 27, said he lived the majority of his adult life on NIU's DeKalb campus and has always held a special place in his heart for his alma mater. After learning of Thursday afternoon's deadly shooting spree in Cole Hall, DeGeorge made the drive from his home in Aurora to support the campus community.
“This school has always been here for me, and when people at this school needed a shoulder to lean on, I knew I had to be here,” DeGeorge said. Hundreds of students, faculty, alumni, friends and family came to the DeKalb campus Friday night to show support and grieve with one another at a communitywide vigil held in the Duke Ellington Ballroom at the university's Holmes Student Center. Political leaders - among them the Rev. Jesse Jackson and state Rep. Robert Pritchard, R-Hinckley - also attended the vigil. Participants packed the room and spilled out into the hallways and down stairwells, holding lighters, cell phones and candles in the air as “Amazing Grace” played softly through the speakers inside the doors. NIU student Adam Edmonds, 25, felt pulled toward the university following the tragedy. “This is a big event that has happened on the campus, and I think everybody needs to come out and show their support,” Edmonds said. Before the vigil, people sang the John Lennon song “Imagine” while near a memory wall placed in the center of the Martin Luther King Commons. Throughout the day, people stepped up to write personal messages and prayers on that memory wall. Words remembering those who were lost, as well as messages of hope and encouragement for current NIU students, were packed onto the memorial. NIU senior Jojee Trinidad, 22, was one of the hundreds to sign the wall. “I thought it was important to pay some respect to those who were affected, especially those who died in the disaster,” Trinidad said. He said that despite the tragedy, he has taken away an important life lesson he will carry with him forever. “It made me realize that we should always love each other - love the people in your lives all the time because you never know when those people could leave you,” Trinidad said. Photographer Kate Weber can be reached at kweber@daily-chronicle.com. |
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