09-30-2006
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County Executive
We are the ones we've been waiting for.
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Member Since: Feb 2005
Location: California
Posts: 382
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Re: The Iraq Page, RIP soldiers
 
Robb G. Needham
Quote:
Oregon Live -- VANCOUVER -- Master Sgt. Robb G. Needham, 51, had the smile of an optimist. Just look at his official Army photo.
"That's him, all the time," said his mother, Margaret E. Needham. "Always smiling, always smiling."
Loved ones remembered Needham Friday as a big-hearted family man who believed it was his duty to serve in Iraq.
Needham died Wednesday when his patrol encountered small arms fire, according to a Department of Defense news release. The Rev. John Bishop, a family pastor, said he was killed by a sniper's bullet while on patrol near Baghdad. He was stationed at Fort Lewis near Tacoma.
He would have turned 52 on Oct. 26, and was among the oldest U.S. soldiers and Marines killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. At least 14 others 50 or older have died in those conflicts.
Yet his age never came up in conversations and e-mails with Bishop, a senior pastor at Living Hope Church in Vancouver, where Needham was a member.
Catherine M. Needham, his wife, is an English teacher at New Generation Christian School, which is affiliated with the east Vancouver church. The couple has an adult daughter and son and two grandchildren. They requested privacy.
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Rest in peace Robb.
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