Shawn Adams remembered by family

Twenty-one year old Army Ranger Sgt. Shawn Adams was offered a chance to study nuclear power with the Navy, but the Dixon native wanted to do something a little more exciting, according to his family.

"The Navy offered him a large amount of money to go to nuclear school, but he said, 'No, I want to jump out of planes,' " his stepfather, Robert Gillis, said today. "He wanted the rush."

Adams, a graduate of Vanden High School, died in Iraq on Sunday after suffering wounds from an improvised explosive device in Owaset. He would have celebrated his first wedding anniversary this Saturday, Gillis said.

"He was a great kid, very dedicated, very determined," he said. "He was 19 years old when he went to Ranger School -- he was the only 19-year-old in his class. He became a sergeant in 2� 1/2 years and was his group leader."

Gillis said Adams was following in the steps of his best friend when he enlisted. That friend was killed last New Year's Eve in a car crash in Texas, Gillis said -- the same night that Adams was injured in Iraq by an explosive that left shrapnel in his leg.

But Adams, who was deployed to Iraq last September and was scheduled to come home this December, recovered quickly and kept fighting, Gillis said.

"He believed in what he was doing -- he believed in fulfilling his commitment," he said, adding that his family did not know exactly what Adams was doing when he was killed Sunday. "He would go on missions, he wouldn't tell us what he was doing. But he was basically a door-kicker, looking for insurgents."

Gillis described Adams as a family man who adored his three younger sisters and was madly in love with his wife, Wilhelmina Elizabeth Adams, or Beth. They met in Anchorage, Alaska, where he was stationed.

"She was the love of his life, the only girl he ever brought home," he said. "I had never seen his eyes light up before (her). She was his everything."

But he was also a risk-taker who never shied away from a challenge, his stepfather said.

"Most boys get fake IDs to go drinking -- he got them so he could go jump out of airplanes (at age 17)," he said. "I asked him why (he joined) and he said, 'If not me, Pops, then who?' "

Adams is survived by his wife, of Anchorage; his stepfather and mother, Laura Gillis, of Dixon; his father, Darcy Adams, and stepmother, Gay Adams, of Vacaville; and three sisters, Lacy, 15, Samantha, 12, of Dixon, and Mary, 7, of Vacaville.

Read the rest at the San Francisco Chronicle

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