Capt. Mark Stubenhofer made such an impression on the people around him that when he died Dec. 7, 2004, two jurisdictions separated by hundreds of miles moved to memorialize him.
In Springfield, Va., where he was raised, the U.S. post office was renamed in his honor. That came a few weeks after Pickens County, S.C., where Stubenhofer graduated from Clemson University's ROTC program, passed a formal resolution commemorating his service. Stubenhofer had attended Clemson on an ROTC scholarship and played second base for the school's baseball team. On his second tour of duty in Iraq, he had already won the Bronze Star. Acquaintances in both Virginia and South Carolina described Stubenhofer as a go-getter, a leader who turned down a desk job to be near his soldiers. He was 30 when he died, shot as his mechanized infantry unit came under attack by insurgents in Baghdad.
Stubenhofer and his wife, Patty, had three children - 5-year-old Lauren, 2-year-old Justin, and a newborn daughter he never saw, but who he stipulated should be named Hope Riley.
"Hope, that's why I'm here. And Riley, that's where it all began," he told his mother during what turned out to be their final phone call.
A long-time carrier for the Washington Post, Stubenhofer was well known in the Springfield area. His funeral procession, at Arlington National Cemetery, was so long that mourners, including his family, had to wait a half hour in blustery winter winds. "It was the whole neighborhood. That was why it took so long," observed Robert Argenteri, a friend.
After his death, family members established a foundation, which they called Mark 's Hope, to benefit Iraqi children. It accepts donations of school supplies, toys and cash, which are sent to his unit to be distributed in Iraq
