“Even though I didn’t know you, I always saw you as the kid who never stopped smiling.”
As students filled out notes in the cafeteria last week memorializing freshman Sam Solomon, they remembered a classmate who, despite his two-and-a-half year battle with leukemia, did not want to be defined by his disease.
Instead, friends, family and teachers will remember him as an excellent student, an avid reader and someone whose positive demeanor was acknowledged throughout the Marshall community, both by students who knew him and those who merely passed him in the hallways.
As one note on Sam’s memorial board read, “Sam was my locker buddy. His smile lit up my morning.”
Solomon was “like a lot of other kids,” English teacher James Macindoe said.
“A lot of my students try to live quiet, ordinary lives and that was what Sam was trying to do.”
Over the past week, friends and family frequently reflected on Sam’s outlook.
“He was really nice,” freshman Ryan Yoon said. “He was a good kid.”
Meanwhile, teachers and family repeatedly spoke of the large role Marshall played in Sam’s life.
History teacher Kathryn Peyton called Sam “a true scholar” as she described his optimism and intelligence.
Sam “held a great value in simply knowing things,” Peyton said.
Sam also valued the time he was able to spend at Marshall.
School was a “refuge” for him, Sam’s mother Maria Solomon explained. Here, Sam “could be Sam and not a patient,” she said.
Maria Solomon said that her son was “wise beyond his years” and continued to express his wisdom in his will.
“Don’t be sad,” Sam wrote. “This is the beginning of something new for me.”