This is a letter from Alan's sister to one of our classmates...

Alan was a fun guy. He was extremely gifted in so many ways. He was very athletic, artistic, musical, and goofy. At the beginning of his senior year he was diagnosed with IGA nephropathy, an autoimmune disease in which the body attacks its own kidneys. He was told his kidneys were failing but he had 10 years or so, but by October of 1990 they had failed.

My older brother Ethan became a kidney donor and Alan was given another chance at life. His transplant took place in January of 1991. After the transplant he did great. There were small issues that required hospitalization but he had such a great attitude that we all took it in stride with him.

He married a sweet Canadian girl, and they lived in Ramona. They were only married about 6 months when he started having fainting spells and fevers. After much testing they removed his spleen and found he had T-cell lymphoma, essentially cancer of the immune system. We don't know what caused the cancer.

He was on massive anti-rejection medication and stopped those at risk of losing the kidney in order to fight the cancer. He died on March 1, 1998. It left a hole in our hearts. His wife has since remarried and moved back to Canada. We all remain very close and have adopted her husband as one of us.