Nathan Fairlie laid to rest

As the sunshine lit the steeple of Allen Memorial Baptist Church, friends and family gathered to say goodbye. Somber, but even in death, Nathan Fairlie, 21, could still make everyone smile. Inside, classmates told stories.

"We talked about how in the ninth grade, he brought a turkey gobbler to class and did it right after our teacher started calling the roll," said Colleen Kafka, Fairlie's classmate.

Once the hour-long service was over, Fairlie's casket was loaded into a hearse with military precision, the hearse adorned with American flags. Then, Fairlie, followed by the procession, made a last trip through Candor. Neighbors created a passageway of red, white and blue.

"This is a very small community, and like a lot of small communities in this area, we really stick together," said Fairlie's former teacher, Colby Westervelt.

Fairlie passed underneath the flag of the country he loved. His longtime desire to serve wasn't lost on anyone who stood in the frigid winter to say so-long to the soldier who was killed in Iraq two weeks ago by a roadside bomb.

"You couldn't believe it, it was unbelievable how great a kid he was, how he worked so hard on his equipment in Iraq, how he had everything ready, and he made everybody laugh," said a Fairlie family friend, David Kelly.

Once the procession made it to the cemetery, dozens gathered around the casket as it was loaded into the Earth. In the distance, a 21-gun salute rang out.

From TWTV 10

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