By ANGIE CHUANGNewington High School junior Brendan Loy takes a camcorder to school every day, capturing images to post on his Web site for school news.
This story ran in the Courant December 6, 1997
So when tragedy struck twice recently at the 16-year-old's school, it seemed natural to memorialize his classmates on the Internet as well, he said.
About 25 users have left messages in an electronic "guestbook,'' a forum for thoughts about the untimely death Nov. 18 of junior Robert Aniello, 16, and the death of freshman Jennifer Partridge, 14, in a bicycle accident the next day.
Nearly 200 have visited the Web site (http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Brendan_Loy/), which also contains links to Loy's tribute to Diana, princess of Wales, as well as sites with news about the Dec. 1 slaying of three students at Heath High School in West Paducah, Ky.
As the Internet becomes an increasingly popular mode of self-expression for young people, more of them are turning to cyberspace to vent frustrations, air opinions - and to grieve.
When rappers Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G. were gunned down, dozens of memorial Web sites sprang up, many of them created by young fans. Princess Diana mourners of all ages shared feelings by signing guestbooks on the Web. According to one Internet search engine, at least 15 new Web sites dedicated to INXS lead singer Michael Hutchence appeared within a week of his death.
For Internet-savvy teenagers like Loy - the editor of Newington High School's student newspaper and publisher of his own unofficial school newspaper - the World Wide Web provides a medium to reach out in a time of crisis.
Recent tragedies at West Hartford's Hall High School and Hartford Public High School also have reached the Internet, whether through a Web site for the student newspaper or a memorial scholarship publicized on a school Web page.
Dr. Rick Blum, a West Hartford psychologist, said memorial Web sites are a healthy and natural way for youths to remember those they have lost.
"Computers aren't at all forbidding to teenagers the way they are to some adults. For kids, it's just an extension of their minds, a land of other people where they can create something that lasts,'' Blum said.
"If you put flowers up on the side of the road, they will die, but if you create a memorial on the Web site, it's going to be there. It is more real to [youths] than it might seem to some older people.''
At Hall High School, the student newspaper's Internet editor, junior Jeff Mellen, said there will be news on the Hall Highlights Web page (http://www.connix.com/~cbacon/hall.html) about the recent death of senior Daniel Kinback after a binge-drinking episode.
The next issue of Hall Highlights, which Mellen has been publishing on the Internet since October 1996, will also include poetry about Kinback written by Hall students.
"We usually don't print poetry, but this is a tragic event and we want to use whatever is appropriate,'' Mellen said. "If that's the way students want to remember him, we're more than willing to accommodate that. Sometimes people want to express their feelings that way.''
The issue will also contain editorials about drug and alcohol use as well as the results of a student survey about alcohol consumption, he said.
Hartford Public High School's Web site (http://www.ntplx.net/~hphs/) features a tribute to 15-year-old Verene Allen, who drowned in the school swimming pool during a party on Nov. 7.
"Verene Allen, a very special senior, was suddenly taken from our midst. An athlete and a scholar, she always had a smile for everyone,'' the Web page reads. Information about a scholarship in honor of Verene will be publicized on the site, it states.
Newington High's Loy said he started his Web page by posting a photo of Robert Aniello the day after his death. Eventually, he added photos of Jennifer Partridge and of messages, poems and flowers left on the two students' lockers and at the site of her accident.
"It helps me deal with it, because it's something I do all the time - publish things in one way or another.''
Though some students at Newington High spoke with school counselors to cope with their grief, Loy said many felt more comfortable talking about the deaths on the Web site.
"Especially those of us who weren't really close [to the students who died], we were feeling really lost and we needed a way to say that,'' he said. "People who feel that way need to express themselves.''
In the Web page's guestbook, mourners share memories of classes they shared with the deceased and express sympathy for their families.
"Well I didn't know either of you but any death hurts,'' one person writes.
"Why, why did you have to die and make the rest of us cry?'' another student writes.
Blum said teenagers are more likely to grieve on the Internet not only because they are more computer literate, but also because they tend to band together in times of crisis more than adults do.
"They're less inhibited to reach out and join together in times of crisis,'' he said. "Those of us that are older could learn something from them.''
Click on the BACK button on your browser to return to the webpage from whence you came.