Sad Times at NIU on the Lincoln Highway

Both Liz and I are in shock by what happened at Northern Illinois University Valentine's Day. We both graduated from there in 1973. I received my MA from there in 1981. We've been back for many functions.

We first learned about it while out for a Valentine's Dinner. A lady asked the owners to turn on the news as she'd just gotten a call from her daughter saying she was ok. The woman had no idea what had happened as this was only a short time after the shootings took place. Both Liz and I happened to be wearing NIU sweatshirts at the time.

We came home and called a friend who had gone back to college and she was at her apartment and had been parked across from Cole Hall just an hour before the shootings.

Yesterday, I talked with another woman who had a daughter who had just graduated from Northern.

At Best Buy in McHenry, Illinois, there was an employee who was a student at NIU. He was unhappy because he couldn't wear Huskie red as the students at Virginia Tech had suggested. Best Buy's color is blue. Had he been working at Circuit City that would have not been a problem.

There is a discussion of it going on at the Illinois LincolnHighway Association's google e-mail group. Our state director, Kay Shelton was close by when the horror took place.

Also, I came across an NIU student's blog where he talks about it. http://holocaustofawesome.com

Illinois Route 38, the original Lincoln Highway, forms a lot of the southern border of Northern's campus.

Now, Northern joins the list with Columbine and Virginia Tech. Sad Days Indeed.