Go Bears!

Some Alumni announcments brought it to my attention that the California Alumnia Association has created an award in honor of Mark Bingham, Class of '93, one of the people who possibly brought down the fourth 9/11 plane in a field in Pennsylvania. The inaugural award is going Wayne Lee, a NASA engineer who was chief mission planner of the Mars Global Surveyor Project. There are some classic Cal quotes in this Contra Costa Times article about both men:

Lee stumbled onto his career during his senior year at Cal. "I was supposed to meet a friend in the Life Sciences Building. I took a wrong turn and somehow ended up in the basement, where I saw a flier that said, 'Spend the summer at the Kennedy Space Center.' I never found my friend, but I decided to apply for the program.

Heh. Getting lost in the Den of the T-Rex can be pretty dangerous. And about Bingham:

Bingham, who led the Cal rugby team to national titles in 1991 and 1993, was the man who jumped out of the stands during the 1993 Big Game and tackled the Stanford mascot, the Tree, forcibly "defoliating" the costume.
"I didn't know Mark personally then," said DeFreece, who was student body president that year. "But I certainly knew about the guy who tackled the Tree."
Todd Sarner, Bingham's friend from high school, said he never spent a day in his adult life without uttering, "Go Bears!" at least once.
"Once, he sent his mother a postcard that said, 'Go Bears! Go Bears! Go Bears! Go Bears!' and on and on until the whole card was covered."

By all accounts, a great man and a great Golden Bear. I'm glad we'll have a yearly opportunity to remember his bravery and spirit.