Stuart A. Wolfer

Wednesday, April 09 2008 @ 03:48 AM EDT

Palm Beach Post -- He called his children beautiful because they looked like their mother.

A blondish-brown-haired woman who married the handsome Stuart Wolfer - a brave, honorable man, all those things fathers and husbands should be and more.

He had three daughters under 6 who likely thought their daddy could conquer the world.

Today he is being mourned by his little girls, his wife, his parents, who live in Boca Raton, and by the many friends who have heard solemn whispers that Wolfer is dead.

They cry, asking why, as they remember this dedicated man.

"When he'd drop his girls off at school, he'd say, 'I love you, beautifuls!' He was truly, truly a special, unique, dynamic person," Lee Anne Wolfer said in a statement Tuesday. "He was loved."

Army Maj. Stuart Wolfer died Sunday while working out in a gym in the Green Zone in Baghdad.

He was one of two to die in a rocket attack and one of more than 4,000 U.S. troops to have died in Iraq.

Wolfer - assigned to the 11th Battalion, 104th Division based in Boise, Idaho - would have turned 37 on April 23.

He was the only son of Esther and Len Wolfer of Boca Raton, who are now grieving with family and friends, trying to make sense of it all.

Knowing that a soldier is in the Green Zone often comforts loved ones because many consider that section of Baghdad safe. It's heavily guarded. It's where U.S. officials live and work.

But it's a reminder that in a war zone, no place is safe.

Over the weekend, he had promised a longtime friend that everything was, in fact, OK.

He said so in an e-mail that Stephanie Lewis opened from her Philadelphia home on Sunday morning.

"All has calmed down," he said, "a lot less indirect fire. I was able to get to the Internet Cafe."

He thanked her for the package of goodies she sent and told her he shared the food with some soldiers from Pennsylvania.

Lewis wrote back, warning that one more box filled with cards and pictures was on its way.

She knew it would cheer him up because he sometimes felt lonely in Iraq.

Lewis ended her e-mail with "Stay safe."

Today, she wonders if Wolfer ever read it.

No one else in Wolfer's family has served in the military, and when he announced his plans to join, a close family friend in Palm Beach County immediately began to worry.

"I screamed bloody murder. ... But he really believed in patriotism," said the woman, who did not want her name revealed. "He was too fine a human being for this to happen."

Wolfer's parents were too heartsick to comment.

They volunteered with a national group that worked to get cellphones to service men and women so they could chat with loved ones back home.

Wolfer was born in Miami. His family moved to Dix Hills, N.Y., where they helped create the Dix Hills Jewish Center, when he was a child. Shortly after Wolfer's bar mitzvah, his family moved back to Florida, this time to Coral Springs, with Stuart and his sister.

He graduated from Taravella High School, joined the Army ROTC program while attending school at Washington University in St. Louis, and was commissioned as a 2nd lieutenant when he graduated in May 1993.

After marrying Lee Anne, he transferred to the Army Reserve and studied law at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.

He was called up to active duty in 2004 and served in Kuwait for a year.

In his civilian job, he worked as a territory manager for Thomson West Legal, which provides legal and business information to legal professionals. He lived on a farm with his wife and daughters, Lillian Wade, 5, Melissa Lacey-Marie, 3, and Isadora Ruth, 1, in Emmett, Idaho.

Wolfer was a spiritual man who followed Jewish rituals on a daily basis, even in Iraq. He made requests for prayer books and other items Jewish soldiers needed, and every morning, even in Iraq, he prayed using Tefillin, leather boxes with Bible verses inside.

On his last tour, he was a pen pal to students at the Mirochnick Religious School of B'Nai Torah Congregation in Boca Raton and would share with them his experience of celebrating Hanukkah overseas.

Education Director Cathy Berkowitz said Tuesday that the students planned to send letters to Wolfer again this year. Now, they'll write to his parents.

Wolfer will be buried this week in Iowa, where Lee Anne's family lives.

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