Vt. Grieving Families Bond in War Video

Students Stephen Robitaille, front, and Amanda Benson work at a video editing station in Northfield, Vt., Thursday, Nov. 9, 2006. Almost a year ago a group of Norwich University students set out collect memories from family members of Vermonters killed in the nation's wars. The students are wrapping up their hour-long documentary, called "Vermont Fallen," but there was an unintended benefit: It helped bring together the families of Vermonters who died in the streets of Fallujah, or Ramadi, on an Iraqi roadside, a remote Afghan plain or the Kuwaiti desert. (AP Photo/Toby Talbot) (Toby Talbot - AP)

NORTHFIELD, Vt. -- As a class project, producing a documentary about Vermonters killed in Iraq and Afghanistan seemed fitting: the videographers attend a military school and Vermont has lost more citizens per capita than most states.

But "Vermont Fallen" has become much more than an academic exercise for a small group of Norwich University students.

The nearly complete documentary has helped draw together the families of soldiers who died in the streets of Fallujah and Ramadi or on a remote Afghan plain.

The families now celebrate together the birthdays of the fallen and support each other by attending the dedications of bridges or playgrounds. They march together in parades wearing T-shirts emblazoned with photos of their loved ones. Sometimes they get together simply to be together.

"We stay in touch almost daily," said Marion Gray of Calais, whose stepson, Jamie, was killed in June 2004 by a roadside bomb in Iraq. "There's already been some very obvious changes in some of the families that were having a really hard time. Some are actually smiling again."

She and her husband were the first to sit for the Norwich cameras.

The documentary, produced by about 15 students as part of a communications class, includes interviews with the families of 21 service members with Vermont connections.

The families will be the first to view the finished product, an hour-long video that the university hopes will be aired on local television stations and, with luck, perhaps some cable networks.

"We made a vow that it was just going to tell their stories," said Norwich senior Sean Dolan, 22, of Braintree, Mass. "They liked the idea that their son, their brother and their husband would be included."

Communications professor William Estill and the students interviewed mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters. Even though some of the service members died almost four years ago, their families' pain appears as raw as the day of their funerals.

"They just wanted somebody to care," Dolan said. "We kind of became that ear for them."

In a 10-minute promotional video, tearful family members talk about their loss, their pride, the emptiness and sometimes, their remorse.