This morning, November 9th, 2006, I received this e-mail from Pat Shatzel:

Dan Oberst died this am.  Carm Urzetta let us know today.   It was a relapse of his cancer as we had unfortunately surmised.

Shatzel

Those of you reading this obviously know who Dan Oberst was. There is nobody in our enormous class who did not. He must be on just about every page of the yearbook. He was our class president. He was our valedictorian. He attended our school on a full scholarship. He was the president of the student council. He was an undefeated all-American wrestler, and played other sports as well. He played in the band. The guy could even sing and dance. He had a starring role in Oklahoma. At Notre Dame, he had THE lead role in a production of How to Succeed, and he won that role when he was just a freshman.

I'm trying to search my memory for a person who had more talent than Dan Oberst or who achieved more than Dan in more different fields. Can't find one. If he was lacking in any achievements, it was only because there are only 24 hours in a day and he could only be in one place at a time. He seemed to have a talent for everything and the work ethic necessary to develop those talents.

Of course, those things are only the partial measure of a man. He had the human side as well. He talked easily with everyone, and always seemed to enjoy the conversation. Amazingly, Dan was lacking in ego, had a great sense of humor, was pleasant to talk to, and was a genuinely good human being. That doesn't leave much out, does it? If he had a dark side, I surely never saw it.

Because of our nature and our culture, obituaries sometimes exaggerate. Not this one. Dan really was all those things. I don't think I am the only member of our class who thought that Dan might some day be the country's President. Why didn't that happen? Well, as we older souls look back on our lives, we sometimes speculate that we should have achieved more, or sometimes that we should have achieved less while spending more time loving our families and just having fun. Life is about balancing everything out.

Dan balanced everything better than anyone I've ever known.

• Here (in Microsoft Word format) is the tribute to Dan in the Irondequoit Post

Here is Dan's obituary from the Rochester paper: