The 21-year-old Fort Richardson soldier from Dixon, Calif., was killed Sunday when a roadside bomb exploded near his vehicle in Owaset, Iraq. Anchorage Daily News -- Sgt. Shawn Adams knew exactly what he wanted to do with his life. And from the beginning, it was going to have to do with being airborne, his family said.
Family and friends watched his ambition play out as he graduated from leaping off his bunk bed, to flying off the roof of his family home in California, and then to jumping out of airplanes -- both in civilian life and then volunteering to become a paratrooper when he joined the Army.
The 21-year-old Fort Richardson soldier from Dixon, Calif., was killed Sunday when a roadside bomb exploded near his vehicle in Owaset, Iraq.
He died on his first wedding anniversary, his stepfather said.
Adams, who had been wounded once before, was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 509th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team (Airborne), 25th Infantry Division. He was the 46th member of the brigade to die in Iraq since the unit deployed there in the fall.
In high school, Adams was an average student when it came to academics -- more interested in playing varsity football than studying, stepfather Robert Gillis said in a phone interview from Dixon.
"Most kids go get a fake ID to get beer," Gillis said. Adams got one to jump out of an airplane. "He really wanted to jump out of an airplane over at the local airport before he was 18."
When Gillis confiscated the bogus ID, his stepson never admitted to the airplane jump -- but Gillis heard about it through Adams' friends.
Adams scored high on the military aptitude test. He turned down an offer from the Navy to go to nuclear school. He was set on being in special forces and jumping out of airplanes, Gillis said. Despite his parents' efforts, he would not be dissuaded.
"We knew it was futile," Gillis said. "I said you could shoot guns off the bridges of a boat. And he said, 'Dad, I don't want to be a squid.' "
Adams' parents signed for his enlistment before he turned 18. He went to boot camp two months after he graduated from high school -- following a cousin who'd enlisted a couple months earlier. He became a sergeant in 2 1/2 years. And at 19 he was the youngest in his class at Ranger school. He was a leader among his group in Iraq, his family said.
He met his wife, 22-year-old Anchorage resident Wilhelmina Elizabeth Adams, who goes by Beth, while stationed at Fort Rich. Gillis said Beth was the love of his stepson's life and the only girl he'd ever brought home to meet the family. They met through friends and dated about four months before getting married.
She did not want to be interviewed Tuesday.
Adams left for Iraq in September 2006. On New Year's Eve, he was on patrol when a piece of shrapnel from an explosion lodged in his upper thigh. On the night he was injured, the cousin he'd followed into the military died in a car crash in Texas.
Adams recovered quickly and went back to work.
Gillis said he talked to Adams about a week before he was killed. He told his family he was bored -- confined to camp on lockdown. He complained about the food and asked his stepfather if he was going to barbecue when he got home.
Adams said he was going to apply to be an instructor at Ranger school in Florida when he was done in Iraq.
The biggest thing about Adams was his heart, his stepfather said. He was devoted to his three sisters and his wife. A California guy at heart, Adams was "all sunshine and no shirt," Gillis said. He loved camping, football and motorcycles.
"He was all boy -- all man, I guess," Gillis said.
Adams will be buried in the Veterans Cemetery near Dixon.