PDA

View Full Version : Tom Stone, AT92 & 'round the world walker, KIA in Afghanistan



TJ aka Teej
03-30-2006, 23:54
Meant2B '97 sent this to the at-l, with his permission I'm sharing it here.
----
In mid to late September 2001 I was traveling through Vermont listening to
the radio when I heard a commercial mentioning about a presentation that was
going to be taking place at a nearby housing development. It was about a
guy that had hiked around the world. A couple of weeks passed by, I forgot
about it, and I tried calling the number to see if I had missed the program
or not. I found out that the program was coming up the following evening,
Wednesday night right before the start of the 2001 Gathering. I was then
wondering if it was going to be Steve Neuman. Turns out I was wrong. This
was another guy that had walked around the world.

The following evening I headed on up to the presentation. The individual
that was running the show was Tom Stone. A central Vermont resident that in
1992 took off on a 7 year walk around the world.

His slide show started with a picture an AT blaze. Like I said he lived in
central Vermont, namely Pomfret, right on the trail. If I remember
correctly he started his hike on April 1. His original plan was to follow
the AT to Katahdin before road walking to the Atlantic.

The third shot of his slide show was of Mount Washington covered in ice. He
had followed the AT from his front door to the top of Mount Washington.
When he got to the top he was told that it was best to ditch his original
plans and get down off the ridge due to the snow conditions.

He went on to walk 22,000 miles through 29 countries over the course of his
seven year hike. His show was fantastic. Way too laid back to put it
modestly. Probably too laid back even by ALDHA standards.

Tom did show up on Friday afternoon while all of us were at the campground.
He couldn't stick around though since he had to go home and get ready to
head up to Burlington for Vermont National Guard training.

At the 2002 Gathering I told John O about Tom. I went on to send John O the
contact information that Tom gave me after his slide show. John O managed
to get ahold of Tom and had him scheduled to do both an afternoon workshop
and an evening program at the 2003 Gathering. Mid summer 2003 Tom got
called up to go over to Afghanistan. I don't know if Tom was oversea during
the Gathering this past year or not.

I was watching the news an hour or so ago when I heard the news that Tom had
been involved in a small arms fire incident in Afghanistan and was killed.
His program was a program that I truly had hoped to see again. I had hoped
that it would make its way to the ALDHA Gathering at some point in time.
Unfortunately this isn't going to happen.

Here's a link to an article about Tom.
http://www.thechamplainchannel.com/news/8349168/detail.html (http://www.thechamplainchannel.com/news/8349168/detail.html)
--
Here's an even better story with more details on his hike. I guess he
hasn't been around for a Gathering since 2002.

http://www.vnews.com/03302006/2994520.htm (http://www.vnews.com/03302006/2994520.htm)


Ryan "MEANT 2B" Crawford
GAME '97, MSG '01, SRK '03

Almost There
03-30-2006, 23:57
Hats off to the man!!! Another hero lost!

Blue Jay
03-31-2006, 19:46
I met him a few times on the trail in Vermont. A truly interesting and wonderful individual. The world is a much poorer place now that he's gone.

neo
03-31-2006, 21:01
i am so sad to hear of his passing,my prayers and thoughts for his family,friends and fellow soldiers:cool: neo

icemanat95
03-31-2006, 21:19
A very sad loss.