Deceased Classmate: Craig "Nickie" Gural 1967 
Date Of Birth:  8/6/1949
Date Deceased: 12/17/1967
Age at Death: 18
Cause of Death: drowned in the Potholes
Classmate City: Moses Lake
Classmate State: WA
Classmate Country: USA
Was a Veteran: No
Survived By: Brother, Steven Gural Mother Father

Search Finds Skater’s Body

Moses Lake, Wash. (AP) – Grant County sheriff’s deputies using a small boat and dragging equipment, recovered the body of Craig N. Gural, 18, Spokane, from a reservoir 12 miles southwest of here Sunday. 

Officers said Gural drowned Saturday after falling through ice while skating.

Gural, son of Mr. and Mrs. A.W. Gural, was a student at Big Bend Community College, and was skating alone when the accident occurred, officers said.

The Oregionian, Monday, December 18, 1967

Nickie was attending Big Bend Community College to become a pilot. To be a pilot was a lifelong dream of his. He was a great friend to many of us during high school. It was shocking to learn of his death (got caught under the ice) while ice skating alone. Such an incredibly 'alone' way to die for someone who absolutely loved being around people. His funeral was 12/16 but I am not sure if the year was 1968 or 1969. Sorry too many years have gone by to remember the year but his funny, happy personality remains in my memory. - Debbie Hensley

And from a newspaper clipping from Debbie:

Spokane Youth Dead in Skating Tragedy

Craig N. (Nick) Gural, 18, E2605 Thurston, drowned Saturday evening in an ice skating accident about 12 miles southwest of Moses Lake in the Potholes Reservoir area, Dr. R. M. Gill, Grant County coroner, reported today.

Gural, the son of Mr. and Mrs. A.W. Gural, was a student at Big Bend Community College and his mother said he was working for his commercial flight license.

Gill said the accident was discovered when Gural didn’t return home and his roommate and a friend went looking for him.  They located his car and after looking around the pond discovered a hole in the ice and Gural’s glove.

Gill and four sheriff’s deputies recovered the body from the pond about 12:30 p.m. Sunday.  Gill said the ice was only about three-quarters of an inch thick where Gural went through although near the shore the ice was four inches thick.

This summer, Gural was a fire fighter for the Priest Lake Timber Protective Association in Northern Idaho.  At the Big Bend school, he worked as a school bus driver.

A 1967 graduate of Ferris High School, he was in his first year at Big Bend Community College.  He was an Eagle Scout, a former member of the Civil Air Patrol and a member of the All-City Band.  He had won several awards in Track events at Ferris.

Gural is survived by a brother, Lt. Stephen Gural at Reese Air Force Base, Tex., and a grandmother, Mrs. Margaret Fuher, Priest River, Idaho.

Funeral services will be held Thursday at 11 at Hazen and Jaeger’s, with the Rev. James W. Montgomery, assistant pastor of Westminster Congregational Church, officiating, and burial will be in Fairmount.