Ruthanne Bloyd, a Department of Defense Dependents School teacher and friend of Cmdr. Charles "Keith" Springle, speaks during a memorial service at U.S. Naval Hospital Rota, Spain. (Jan Hammon / Courtesy of U.S. Navy)
Friends and colleagues of Cmdr. Charles Springle, one of five servicemembers killed Monday by a soldier at Camp Liberty in Iraq, gathered in Rota, Spain, on Friday to reflect on his life and his service.
The ceremony took place in the courtyard of the base hospital where Springle — "Keith" to his friends — was assigned from 1994 to 1998, and again from 2003 to 2007. He was based at Camp Lejeune, N.C., and working at the Camp Liberty stress center when he and the others were shot.
"There was nothing halfway about Keith," Ruthanne Bloyd, a friend of Springle’s who teaches algebra at David G. Farragut High School in Rota, said in a telephone interview following the ceremony. "He was a very gregarious person, always ready to help."
Bloyd collected and read e-mails from friends around the world, who wanted to participate in the ceremony.
"He loved his family with a heart bigger than he was, and he meant the world to them as well," wrote Mika Stacy, a college senior in Alabama.
"… [H]e managed to go above and beyond for us to provide new equipment/uniforms … and could be found well before baseball season performing yard work on our less than reputable field to give us the nicest field possible…," wrote Josh Hughes, now a student at Florida State University.
"In spite of his love for baseball, he made it very clear that school came first," wrote Michel Schadt, now a Department of Defense Dependent Schools teacher in Japan. "It was so interesting to watch a man who was normally very calm, become so, what would be an appropriate word, animated as soon as he set foot on the baseball field."
Springle’s passion to see the children in his community succeed and his passion for baseball are some of the things Bloyd said he would be remembered for.
Several members of the Rota high school faculty have asked for the baseball field to be renamed in Springle’s honor.
"He really built the baseball program here," Bloyd said. "We all remember Keith driving that Rota beater on the field to get it ready for a game. He was so enthusiastic and intent on the kids having good skills on the field and in the classroom.
"I can see him up in heaven looking down at that ball field, during the seventh-inning stretch singing ‘Take Me Out to the Ball Game.’ "
