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thedrifter
06-17-07, 05:22 AM
June 17, 2007
‘I just wanted him honored’
U.S. 60 stretch named for Marine killed in Iraq

By James I. Davison
Staff writer


Emma Johnson wanted to make sure people would always have a way to remember her grandson Lance Cpl. Adam J. Crumpler, so she started making contacts and writing letters to the state Legislature.

Now, anyone who drives on U.S. 60 near Riverside High School in Quincy will see a large road sign that names the section of highway in his honor.

A set of signs read: Adam Johnson Crumpler, Memorial Midland Trail, U.S. Marine Corps, Iraq.

Family and community members gathered on Saturday in the school from which Crumpler graduated in 2003 to dedicate the Memorial Midland Trail to him. The Campbells Creek native was 19 when he was killed in Iraq nearly two years ago to the day.

“It makes me proud to know that they left him enough to honor him,” said Johnson, who took over the job of raising Crumpler and his sister after their mother died when they were young. “It means everything to me because he was such a good boy and I just wanted him honored.”

State Sen. Dan Foster, D-Kanawha, presented Crumpler’s grandmother and sister with smaller versions of the actual highway sign. He said Johnson was the driving force behind the Legislature’s passing resolutions to name the stretch of highway after Crumpler.

Johnson’s “love for [her grandson] inspired us to work hard to properly memorialize this young man,” Foster said. “It takes persistence to do these sort of things, and she certainly had that.”

Cpl. Joseph Faw of Wilkesboro, N.C., met Crumpler a year before his death, and the two became good friends.

Crumpler was a jokester who was fun to goof around with, Faw said during the Saturday ceremony.

“He was a great Marine, a great friend. He’ll always be in our hearts,” he said.

The signs will be visible to students and members of the community, said Lynn Gattlieb, a counselor at Riverside High School.

“When [Crumpler] passed away, it was a very large service and there was a huge turnout,” she said. “It will be a definite reminder; they are very visible signs.”

For those who knew him best, though, Crumpler will be remembered for having a personality that could light up a room and a desire to serve his country, Johnson said.

“He always wanted to be a Marine, from the time he was little, [to] make a career out of it,” she said.

People also remember him for dying a hero.

Last month, Johnson was presented with a certificate of valor for her grandson’s heroic acts before he died in June 2005.

“The day he was killed, he put himself in the line of fire to save his squad,” she said. “His whole squad was behind him and there were three or four shots, and he was the only one that was killed.”

To contact staff writer James I. Davison, use e-mail or call 348-5119.

Ellie