When Spec. Craig S. Frank was told last year that his father was about to go through open-heart surgery back home in Lincoln Park, Mich., he promised to be there even though he was stationed to Iraq
“He said he’d come home if he had to walk,” said his brother, Timothy.
It took some bureaucratic wrangling, with assistance from the Red Cross, and a plane ticket paid for by his parents to get it done, but eventually Frank was granted an emergency three-week leave from June 13 to July 3.
The sudden trip home proved to be precious.
Two weeks after he returned to Iraq, Frank, 24, died on July 17, near Baghdad, when his convoy vehicle hit an improvised explosive device. Frank was assigned to the Army National Guard’s 1775th Military Police Company from Pontiac, Mich. His family said he was posthumously promoted to sergeant.
A swimmer and runner in high school, Frank was an avid reader who devoured books from science fiction to mythology to the classics whenever he got a chance. He was enrolled in Eastern Michigan University and hoped to teach history.
Frank’s father is doing well after surgery, Timothy Frank said, a fact that was helped by his son’s returning home.
“It worked out that we all had a chance to spend some alone time with him,” his brother said. “I treasure that time we had together. We all do.”
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Would-be animator: U.S. Marine Gunnery Sgt. Shawn A. Lane had a knack for drawing and one day hoped to become a cartoon character animator. He also talked about opening a coffee shop with his wife, Jennifer.
He once shared his portfolio with Don Bluth, the well-known former Walt Disney animator, over dinner. Bluth “looked at his drawings, and he thought he was terrific,” his father, John, said.
Lane, 33, formerly of Corning, N.Y., died July 28 during enemy action in Al Anbar Province, Iraq. He was assigned to Headquarters Battalion, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, based at Camp Pendleton, Calif.
A Marine who was five years away from retirement, Lane fought in the Gulf War, Iraqi Freedom and Iraqi Freedom II. He was a skilled radio communications man who studied the subject before and during his military career.
Raised in Corning, N.Y., he graduated from East High School, where he played baseball and football.
As a Marine Security Guard stationed in Hong Kong, he guarded the American Consulate and, while there, met his wife. They were married in 1998 and had a son who is now 5.
Though he mostly kept in touch with family through e-mail, he called his father from Iraq on Father’s Day. It was their last conversation. “He wasn’t fond of being there, but it was his duty and he went,” his father said. “We are very proud of him.”
Loved barbecues: Staff Sgt. Chuck Kiser loved barbecues–especially if they were at his neighbor’s house, joked his wife, Deb Kiser.
“We live in a very close-knit, old-fashioned neighborhood where the motto is if you smell smoke, that’s your invitation,” she said of their home in Cleveland, Wis.
The summer get-togethers were reminiscent of Chuck Kiser’s days growing up in Ohio, one of six children in a family that liked to go to church and go camping together.
Kiser, 37, who served 15 years in the Navy before transferring to the Army Reserve in 2002, was killed June 24 when a car bomb exploded outside of the police training academy where he was working. He was a member of the 330th Military Police Detachment based in Sheboygan.
Kiser was raised in Ohio, where he ran as a sprinter for the University of Cincinnati and for McNicholas High School, in Amelia.
“His confidence was contagious and his spirit was unmistakable,” co-worker Tim Murray said in a eulogy for Kiser. “His temples constantly pulsed, and he walked around most of the time with this wonderfully stupid grin on his face. That alone made seeing him each night at work well worth being there.”
Deb Kiser said her husband had the same passion for any task he took on–whether it was coaching his son’s Little League baseball team or serving as a squad leader and convoy commander for combat missions in Mosul, Iraq.
“He was optimistic,” she said. “He was optimistic about the work he was doing and about the future of Iraq.”