Remembering Jesse

Jesse Dannels was the guy whose game face was always ruined by an uncontrollable urge to smile. Everyone who knew Jesse knew "that smile," Chinook High School wrestling coach and family friend Perry Miller said.

"He'd look over and say, 'I got this one, coach' - he couldn't keep from smiling the entire time," Miller said.

Perry Miller spoke to Havre Daily News Monday, the day after Jesse's vehicle collided with a semitractor-trailer and the Chinook student died.

Miller was devastated, but together enough to tell the paper that "Jesse had been on my arms since he was a baby."

Jesse was on his way to a super bowl party at the Millers when the crash happened.

Wednesday's memorial service for Jesse in Chinook High School's Floyd Bowen Gymnasium brought close to as many people together than there are Chinook residents, people estimated. Friends and classmates and teachers and family members and athletes and even media - by the time the service began, it was standing room only.

In honor of Jesse, many Hi-Line athletes wore their letter jackets: Havre High wrestling, Harlem wrestling, Chester/Joplin-Inverness football, Turner boys basketball, Cut Bank wrestling, Shelby wrestling and Power-Dutton-Brady football, among them.

The throng of people quietly and slowly moved into the gymnasium as Israel Kamakawiwo'ole's ukele-driven "Over The Rainbow/What A Wonderful World" played over the speakers, followed by Fleetwood Mac's "Landslide."

People were crying. People were hugging. People were holding each other. People were crying even more.

Pastor Jack Mattingly told everyone that the point was to celebrate Jesse.

Jesse loved people, all people - young people, old people. He was friends with everyone - "it was easy for him," Mattingly said.

Mattingly said when he was substitute teaching - which was never easy - the job became easier when he taught a class with Jesse in it.

"I knew I would at least have one good class," he said.

Football coach Scott Friede shared a story about when the senior players hazed a freshman. The Chinook football team has a tradition that, if they make the playoffs, the freshmen get bad haircuts. The Sugarbeeter players implemented this tradition last fall.

Only one of the freshmen got a bad haircut, "one that made him look like one of the Three Stooges," Friede said.

As ridiculous as the student looked, Friede said Jesse, who was a senior, cut his hair like an old bald man, shaving it on top, because he didn't want the freshman to be the only one with a bad haircut.

"Jesse had a haircut only a mother could love," Friede added, smiling.

Friede rapped a list of words that describe Jesse: "Caring. Loyal. Goofy. Dedicated. Determined. Funny. Right. Leader. Inspired. Photogenic. Positive. Awesome. Smile. Forgetful only when asked to do something by his mother - just an incredible kid."

The football coach said that if giving last year's state championship trophy back would bring Jesse back, he'd do it in a second.

Miller, who coached Jesse's older brother Ryan in wrestling before coaching Jesse, spoke after Friede.

Miller remembered, while he was coaching Ryan, Jesse poking his head near the mat, wearing that grin, and asking, "How do you think they're going to do, coach?"

"It's amazing the number of people this young man touched in his young 18 years - he touched hundreds, thousands," Miller said.

"Why Jesse?" Miller asked rhetorically. Why did something so tragic happen to someone so young who was so loved and who loved back so much?

"I don't have the answer. God has another purpose and another mission for Jesse," Miller said.

Ryan Reid, Jesse's older brother, said that during his 22-hour drive to Chinook for his brother's funeral, it occurred to him that he didn't have one bad memory about his "baby brother." He looked over to his right, where his other two brothers were standing, and said, "And that's hard to say - we're brothers. I have plenty of bad memories of these guys."

Ryan's voice boomed across the gymnasium.

"Jesse's name means 'gift from God' - and he was exactly what we needed in our home," Ryan said. "Though Jesse's eyes were weak, he had very strong heart sense. He radiated love, my little brother. He preached with his life."

Ryan read a note that Jesse once wrote to his swimming teammates.

"In Jesse's own words," he said before reading:

"Winning isn't everything, "Be kind to the winner when you lose - and beat them next time,

"Love what you do,

"Cherish every moment you can,

"I will never forget any of you,

"See you on the flipside."

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Havre Daily News sports reporter Chris Peterson contributed to this report