| Welcome to the Cooperstown Crier |
|
||||||||||||
|
|
|
4-12-2007 By CASEY CAMPBELL Staff Writer That night people gathered in each other’s homes, crying, hugging and trying to comprehend the senseless death of their loved one at the tender age of 18. The next morning, dozens of students, parents and faculty congregated at Cooperstown middle/high school, where classes had just suspended for the spring break. They came to mourn and share the grief of a village that had lost one of its treasured sons, a kid most everyone knew by name and by deed. Many of Gentile’s classmates eventually made their way to the accident scene on County Route 33 in Middlefield, where shattered glass and small pieces of his totaled sport-utility vehicle could still be found Friday. More than 15 had gathered there by 11 a.m., some of them looking through the brush and finding some of Gentile’s possessions: a bottle of cologne, a broken CD case. "He was everybody’s friend," said senior Stephen Guarneri. "The punch-line king." He was never scared, his friends said, and always the first one to laugh. They talked about his idiosyncrasies, how he would say "let it rain" when tossing out a milk carton after lunch, how he challenged people by saying "you wouldn’t, you’re scared," and how he gave nicknames to absolutely everyone. There were many nicknames for Gentile too, said senior Luke Banner, one of which was the "fastest tongue in the East." He said the name came from a rapid tongue flick Gentile displayed while out with friends. One night at Denny’s restaurant in Oneonta, the subject came up and Gentile somehow found himself in a competition with their waitress. The two attempted to flick their tongues more rapidly than the other to see who was faster. In the end, they gave each other autographs, Banner said. Students returned to the crash site throughout the day, some leaving flowers or other mementos " like a Hungry Man frozen dinner and a sixpack of root beer with the "root" crossed out " in their wake. And they mourned him as only children of the information age could: by going online. Within hours of the 6:30 p.m. crash, a CCS sophomore started the group "A Memorial to Chris Gentile" on the social networking website Facebook. com. Open to CCS students with registered accounts, the group was created "in honor of Chris, his family and his friends. He was known by many and loved by all." More than 100 current and former students had joined by Friday afternoon, many of them posting notes to Gentile on a public message board. Their words echoed the pain they felt from losing him and the joy they experienced while knowing him. "It’s just not fair," posted a female junior. "Thousands of kids make the same mistake every day and nothing happens. Why you?" "You have no idea the impact you had on Cooperstown and everyone that lives there," wrote a graduate from the class of ’05. “It will never be the same without you. So many people love you and will always miss you. I just wanted to let you know how much of a positive influence you had on myself and so many others." Members could also post pictures of Gentile in the group’s photo gallery and more than 30 had been posted by Tuesday. Most of the pictures show him in the company of friends, arms around two or three of them and the bright smile he was known for spread across his face. A second group, open to anyone who creates an account on the Facebook website, was formed early Friday morning, in response to calls that people who were not CCS students wanted to join. The group, "R.I.P. Chris Gentile, April 5, 2007," indicates the widespread impact Gentile had on people, even those he met just in passing. One girl, a graduate from the class of 2004, posted a note describing an encounter she had with Gentile while he was working at The Red Nugget ice cream parlor one summer. "I had the most crappy day at work," she wrote. "The Dreams Park kids had hit the limit with me and all I wanted was a really big sundae. When you finally handed it to me after hearing me continue to complain about my bad day, all you said was ‘the sundae is on me, I hope your day is better.’ And because of that, it was." |
Copyright 2007, Cooperstown Crier, Cooperstown, NY All rights reserved