Lance Cpl Taylor Bradley Prazynski
Born: November 11, 1984
Died: May 9, 2005 in AL Karmah, Iraq
Lance Cpl. Taylor B. Prazynski of Fairfield, Ohio graduated from Fairfield High School in 2003 where he ran track and was a wide receiver for Fairfield’s football team. He also took an interest in helping students with disabilities. Taylor was a student that made a difference. Once such example, was a fellow student, Josh Dixon, who has spina bifida. Taylor helped teach him how to walk. It was just a few years after that kindness, that the grateful student walked back into Fairfield High on his own two feet to attend the funeral of Taylor. Taylor was born on Veterans Day when his father who was a Staff Sgt was stationed at Hill Air Force Base. Young Taylor grew up on military bases in Utah and Illinois. When his father retired in 1989, Taylor already had military life in his veins. His favorite hang out was the Army Goods Store where the owners had hung a photo of a six year old Taylor since 1990. In it, he was wearing a beret and camouflage. After his death, the store hung a second photo up a young man set to start out in his own military career, again dressed in military clothes. Taylor trained at Paris Island and following a peace-keeping stint in Haiti, his battalion was deployed to Fallujah, Iraq in January. Taylor was making plans for the future, including his desire to buy a truck, find an apartment and start college to study to become a teacher. Taylor was baptized at Vineyard Community Church in Springdale. He is survived by his mother, Claudia Focke-Curati and his father and step-mother, John and Carol Prazynski. Taylor was preceded in death by his grandparents, Hershel and Siegrid Curati, and Francis J. Prazynski. He was killed at age 20 in an explosion while he was conducting combat operations against enemy forces in Karmah, Iraq.
Marines
3rd Battalion
8th Marine Regiment
2nd Marine Division
II Marine Expeditionary Force
Camp Lejeune, North Carolina
Burial is at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia – Sec 60 Site 8111
The Lance Cpl Taylor Bradley Prazynski by Freedom Remembered, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.