Eleven days before he died in Iraq, 1st Lt. Ryan P. Jones wrote a letter to his Massachusetts alma mater.

"The enemy's most dangerous weapon is the improvised explosive, or IED," Jones wrote to the ROTC program at Montachusett Regional Vocational Technical School. "Each day my platoon and I patrol the streets of Baghdad looking for these IEDs. Once we find one, we either blow it up or disarm it. Never a dull moment!

"There have been a few times the IEDs have found us before we found them, but don't worry; our trucks have enough armor on them to survive most blasts," he added.

Jones, 23, a native of Westminster, Mass., was killed May 2, 2007, in Baghdad when the vehicle he was aboard struck one of the homemade bombs during combat operations. Jones was assigned to Special Troops Battalion, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, Fort Riley.

He was born and raised in Westminster, a small town of 6,000 about 50 miles west of Boston.

"A lot of kids go through high school," Montachusett Superintendent-Director James Culkeen told the Associated Press. "For the teachers and administrators, there are some who fall through the cracks, some you don't know, some you know — but everybody knew this kid. It's really a tragic loss."

Jones earned a master's degree in civil engineering from Worchester Polytechnic Institute in 2005.

"Ryan was always willing to help others and he would help you in such a way that you didn't know you were being helped," associate professor Ralph Mallick told the AP. "It is a terrible loss of human life, youth, energy and education."

Family and friends recall that Jones was well liked; after joining the Army in May of 2005, he would often urge his mother to send care packages to his entire unit.

"This young man had a knowledge-based maturity that was well beyond his years," Capt. N. Lee Bliss Jr. said at Jones' Ft. Riley memorial service. "He had an insatiable zest for life."

Jones graduated from the Engineer Officer Basic Course at Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., in December of 2005 and was assigned to the newly-formed 4th Brigade Special Troops Battalion with the 1st ID at Fort Riley.

As a platoon leader, Jones participated in numerous collective field training events to include brigade consolidated gunnery, company combined arms live-fire exercises, and a rotation to the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif. He deployed with his unit to Iraq in early February.

He was awarded the following medals: Bronze Star, Purple Heart, Army Commendation, Army Achievement (2nd award), National Defense Service, Iraqi Campaign, Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary and Global War on Terrorism Service, as well as Army Service and Overseas Service ribbons; and the Combat Action Badge.

He is survived by his parents, Kevin and Elaine Jones.