Penn State graduate Teresa Timmerman has been running in the Marine Corps Marathon in Arlington, Va. for a long time.
And this year will be the 25th consecutive year she’s competed in the annual race– making her the only woman to do so.
But this year is special for another reason: she’ll be hitting the pavement to honor two fallen Marines and help raise money for a Penn State ROTC scholarship.
Timmerman says she’s had the honor of experiencing two different communities with a powerful sense of familial connection – the Marines, and Penn State. How fitting, then, that she met Capt. Todd M. Siebert and Maj. Samuel M. Griffith when they were students in Penn State’s Naval ROTC program.
“Since this is such a big year for me, I really wanted to do something special for these kids,” Timmerman says. “They were students of my husband’s when he was the [Executive Officer of Naval ROTC] at Penn State. I’d known them since they were teenagers.”
Both were in the same fraternity that Timmerman and her husband had been in as undergrads, and she says her husband would often come home with humorous stories about their antics that day.
She fondly recalls attending the annual Marine Ball and dancing with both students, attending Griffith’s wedding and running into Siebert at other Marine weddings she attended over the years.
“We were connected in many ways. They were like my sons,” Timmerman says. “They were great kids, and great Marines. And then the worst thing of all happened.”
Siebert, 34, died on Timmer’s daughter’s birthday in February 2007. Griffith, 37, died in December 2011, only weeks away from Christmas and his son’s birthday. Both were killed in the line of duty while serving in Afghanistan.
Both times, Timmerman learned of their deaths within 24 hours.
“They both had two kids when they died. It’s truly heart wrenching,” she says. “We were just devastated for their families, to see such promising, worthwhile lives cut short.”
The Timmermans weren’t the only people Griffith and Siebert made an impression on. The ““Semper Fidelis Fallen Marine Memorial Award” was set up in their honor for the Penn State ROTC program, and it raised over $25,000 in its first 72 hours of existence.
Timmerman is running this year to spread the word about this scholarship, asking members of her Marine and Penn State families to donate $25.00 to help support the future Marines at her alma mater. Donations can be made online.
“I am so pumped for this year’s race, because this is for Sam and Todd,” Timmerman says, and recalls an old Marine catchphrase.
“Every day is a holiday, every meal a feast, every paycheck a fortune, and every formation a family reunion.”
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