Jeff was a competitor, he loved playing sports and he loved a challenge. His favorite sports were baseball and basketball. He was the home run hitter and played pitcher and catcher on the baseball team. His wicked fastball and ability to throw out base runners turned heads on the baseball diamond. He was the starting center on the football team and was a finalist the past three years in the annual skills competition. In his early years he played goalie and mid fielder for his soccer team. One of his favorite sports was basketball. Jeff was a good ball handler and he loved to shoot the three pointers.
Jeff was a gifted student and earned straight A’s every year. What is amazing to us is that even as he was going through his treatments, missing school and dealing with a deadly disease he maintained straight A’s. Jeff was looking forward to Junior High and didn’t want to fall behind. He kept a journal of the things that made him happy that contained his thoughts, favorite sayings, poems, stories and drawings. It is one of our most treasured items. One of those sayings is permanently engraved on a plaque which hangs on the wall of Ridge Jr. High. It became the theme of an award which will be handed out annually to a noteworthy 7th grade scholar athlete at the Fall Sports Banquet. It reads… “Never Give Up! Set goals that seem impossible, with perseverance you can see how easy they are to achieve.”
Date of Birth: 10/17/91
Date of Diagnosis: 1/14/04
Date of Death: 9/8/04
More of Jeff’s Story can be found on his web sites located at
www.jeffreyh.com and www.jthf.org.
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