YARNELL, Ariz. — In the middle of Yarnell in Yavapai County is a memorial dedicated to those who died protecting their community.
The Yarnell Hill Fire Memorial was created with donations from people across the world and built by those in Yavapai County. Lew Theokas, a captain with the Peeples Valley Fire Department is one of the many who helped create the memorial.
“It’s been an interesting and long journey. Ten years it’s hard to fathom,” Theokas said.
In 2013, 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots died in one of the deadliest wildfires in the U.S. One of the firefighters, Garret Zuppiger was Theokas' grandson.
A giant stainless steel photo of Zuppiger and the other hotshots sits in the middle of the memorial site. It shows all of them stacked on top of each other in a pyramid formation. Theokas said it was taken a week before the Yarnell Hill Fire.
“Everyone's smiling, everyone's happy,” he said. “This is how they thought of each other. This is who they were and we wanted to project that.”
Theokas still remembers the last time he spoke with his grandson. It was the day they lost their lives.
“The day that they perished we did get to talk to [Zuppiger] and he always ended our phone conversations with, 'I love you',” Theokas said.
He described his grandson as kind, compassionate and caring. Theokas said all the hotshots were like that.
“He's missed. They're all missed,” Theokas said.
It took seven years to construct the memorial. It brought the community of Yarnell together and made them stronger. Something Theokas thinks about a lot.
“The sacrifice gave us all something to think about in terms of taking care of the people in our lives,” he said.