About 2,700 people attended the funeral of the brand new fireman, who died in a training exercise in Osceola County, Florida. David Iannelli, (paper says volunteer) from the world headquarters of JWs gave the eulogy. Notice that there is no flag on the casket. However, his hat and other mementos are there. And the firefighters saluted as his casket was placed on the back of the engine to be carried to the cemetery. See top story entitled "Rookie fireman buried" at:
Jehovah's Witness Fireman Buried
by Kenneson 1 Replies latest social current
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abbagail
Hi Kenneson: Thanks for the Orlando Sentinel link. I saw this on the news earlier last week and wrote up a summary of what I saw/heard on the TV. FWIW... Grits
------------------News report from FLA:
Last week in Orlando, FL, two firemen were killed during a training session (an unexpected back-draft killed them). I didn't pay too close attention to the specifics until yesterday (Monday 8/6/02) afternoon's news. The younger of the two firemen's funeral was held Monday to begin at 5:30 pm, and the news channels covered it again and again at 5, 5:30, 6, 11pm, and again during this morning's early news, 5, 5:30, 6 and 6:30 am.
Evidently the younger of the two firemen killed, Dallas Begg, was a JW, and this was mentioned quite a few times in these TV news reports. They said he was a rookie fireman working his second shift, and had only been on the job for 8 days when he was killed. He was 20 years old. He had only been married 4 months. His father said he had loved people and wanted to help them from the time he was a boy; and that he was not even old enough legally to have a drink when he was killed.
The funeral was held at what used to be called the Tupperware Auditorium in Kissimmee, FL. Now it is called ____ Performing Arts Center (or something).
All three local news channels reported from the funeral and stated and showed film clips of the 2,000+ people at the funeral: "family, friends and firemen from all over the country, some from as far away as New York," per the reporters. The pallbearers were firemen from his "firefighting training class." They said the services began 45 minutes late due to so many people coming, trying to get in and get seated. They stated there were hordes of firetrucks "from all over the state" at the funeral, and the firetrucks led the procession to the cemetary after the services, and they showed a map of the procession route.
His father said "it's a nightmare we cannot wake up from." They showed pictures of his high school graduation and said he had been an honor roll student; they said he had been a saxophone player and drummer. Another fireman read a poem/letter at the services which the wife, Rachel, had written. When this fireman spoke, he thanked Begg's family for allowing him to be part of their family, and for raising Dallas as they did, as that is why this man loved the young man. The newscaster said again that Dallas was raised as a JW and was always helping/caring about people "from the time he was a young kid."
They showed the inside of the auditorium numerous times, with the closed casket on the stage, flowers, podium, and Kingdom Melodies playing softly in the background. The newscaster mentioned that normally a fireman's funeral would have American flags all around and draped over the casket, but because Dallas Begg was a JW, there would be no flags since JWs "do not believe in flags and things like that," said one of the reporters.
They stated the Fire Chief would be presenting the widow with the Gold Medal of Honor for firemen.
In the 11 pm news, they showed all of the above, along with the brother at the podium giving the memorial talk (Ionelli was his name, it showed), and Ionelli said how Dallas Begg had "tremendous empathy for people..." and then the reporter cut in saying Dallas "was devoted to his work as a Jehovah's Witness;" and then back to Ionelli giving the talk saying that besides helping people, Dallas Begg "wanted to be a firemen because of the schedule, 24 hours on and 48 hours off, which would give him the time he needed to devote to his [pause] ministry..." [Ionelli was speaking v-e-r-y slowly, btw, which I suppose is normal for funeral talks.]
The investigation into the deaths will begin next week, they said. The other fireman who died was an 11 year veteran, a lieutenant, and his funeral had been held on Saturday.
End of News Report.
Comment: He was a nice looking young man with a crewcut. I did not know any of these JWs since I do not live in Orlando but within the Orlando news TV-range. Of the entire memorial talk, I thought it was interesting the news only showed the comment about a fireman's schedule. (Of course, I couldn't watch all three channels at once, so kept flipping to catch as much of what each was showing.)