Students saved by school heroes
In self-sacrifice, three die
Go out and buy your kid an Aaron Feis mask. Or a Chris Hixon hat. Or a Scott Beigel shirt.
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School stockpiled real-life superheroes disguised as coaches.
They did not wear capes. They did not use special effects. And you won’t see them in any Marvel movie.
Assistant football coach Feis, athletic director and wrestling coach Hixon and cross country coach Beigel instinctively and without hesitation gave their lives so that the children they loved and mentored and taught and coached could live.
Feis shielded at least one student from the mass murderer/terrorist who turned Parkland, Fla., into another killing field Wednesday.
A security officer at Stoneman Douglas, Feis was an offensive lineman and center for the school in the 1990s before returning to coach in 2002. He coached JV football for eight years and was mostrecently the team’s offensive line coach and college recruiting coordinator.
Yet, to hear those children he coached — and they are still children — Feis was the sort of coach that every school needs. He worked with students to get their grades up to par to play football. He was a counselor. He was a friend. “Everyone loved him,” a player said.
“He was a big ol’ teddy bear,” head football coach Willis May told the SunSentinel of Fort Lauderdale. “Loyalty — I trusted him. He had my back. He worked hard. Just a good man. Loved his family.” Feis had a wife and young daughter.
The dad of one Stoneman Douglas student put it best on Twitter: “My son told me ‘No matter what happened, we could always go to Coach Feis.’ ”
Feis responded first to the “Code Red” that signaled a murderous rampage was underway Wednesday. He warned all on the school’s radio they were not hearing firecrackers.
By the way, it is never firecrackers.
Feis’ last act on earth was that of an offensive lineman. He threw a block between a female student and a volley of gunfire, as he pushed her out through a door into safety.
A Hall of Fame move if there ever was one.
Feis’ toddler lost her dad so that another dad would not lose his daughter. Good luck trying to grasp the “why” in all of this.
Feis’ story, sacrifice and name must never be forgotten.
The same holds for Beigel and Hixon.
Beigel, a social studies teacher, unlocked a door to his room to let students escape the carnage. He was shot and killed while trying to lock the door. He was a “favorite teacher” among several students who spoke after the shooting, including one girl who had to walk past his dead body after the shooting stopped.
Hixon, 49, was a Naval Reservist who served in Iraq. He was Broward County’s athletic director of the year last year. He helped build and maintain Stoneman Douglas into an athletic powerhouse. The school’s baseball team won a national title in 2016 and once had Anthony Rizzo (he of the Cubs and formerly Red Sox) on its roster.
“Chris is probably the nicest guy I have ever met. He would give you the shirt off his back. It is so senseless,” Coral Springs High School AD Dan Jacob told the Sun-Sentinel. “I am crushed. … I am totally crushed.”
As are the rest of us.