Background on Cpl Dieruf and the Memorial Fund:
To give you some background… (I’m not very good at telling my story in short format. Too many good memories and details to cut out.) In short, I was a 22 year old Iraqi War Widow, having lost my Marine husband of just 3 months when he was killed on April 8, 2004. Nich was the first in Fayette County to lose his life serving Operation Iraqi Freedom. Local news stations covered the story for weeks….it seemed every time we turned on the TV the reporters were talking about Nich. In an effort to channel our pain and devastation into something positive, our family established the Cpl Nich Dieruf Memorial Fund, which is still alive and well today…18 years later!… serving as the endowment to USA Cares (a Kentucky-based non-profit that supports post 9/11 veterans).
One of the best, semi-recent, articles about my marriage to Nich, the tragic loss and how we work (still) to overcome it was written by a UK staffer when we ran the Marine Corp Marathon in 2019: http://uknow.uky.edu/uk-healthcare/uk-employee-run-marathon-memory-late-husbands-service-country?j=133994&sfmc_sub=122675428&l=18687_HTML&u=4002973&mid=10966798&jb=0.
Or here is a link to the news coverage of our Alaskan mountain climb upto Gold Star Peak from Aug 2020: https://www.wkyt.com/2021/09/02/lexington-woman-climbs-gold-star-tribute-alaska-mountain-honor-late-husband/.
Thanks again,
Emily
Monday Aug 8, 2022 – Champions Trace Golf Course