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R.I.P.--TIGGER--Matthew Helms

Recovry4x4

LLM/Member 785
Super Moderator
Steel Soldiers Supporter
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GA Mountains
Members, while the shock of this is still fresh, please go through your photo collections and look for photos of Matthew. If you attend the GA Rally, please print and bring a few. If not I will set something up to email them. We will need print photos of any quality at the rally.
 

m715mike

Well-known member
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Montgomery, Texas
Like others, I only knew Mathew through his posts on SS and, as such, have been reluctant to contribute to this thread.

It has lifted my heart to read the stories and share in the pictures posted here by his friends. What a magnificent man and an inspiration to us all! I gladly change my avatar in his honor, and I continue to pray for his family and loved ones.
 

zout

In Memorial
In Memorial
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Location
Columbus Georgia
If I can get time - in the previus GA Rally photo array's I am sure I had lots of pics on Matt as well as the ones from a year ago him getting his jeepy stuck belly button deep and him standing on his seats to not get soaked - when he came back to the campground talking about it was the best fun he had since getting the jeepy going. He did not care what shape the jeep was in as he had worked hard on getting it there and was going to have some fun.
 

USAFSS-ColdWarrior

Chaplain
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I've never changed my avatar since creating the original. I've navigated the seldom traveled techie path to do this in Tigger's memory....

Tigger: I raise your flag over my "compound" as your brother here, and as your brother-in-Christ. May the double-meaning of the red CROSS be recognized by all. AMEN.
 

EMD567

Driver for the Ga Mafia
Steel Soldiers Supporter
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Done. And since I change avaters about as fast as can walk around the Long Easy, mine will stay up awhile.
 

CARNAC

The Envelope Please.
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I'm glad you posted those specific pictures. I have to say that even though he is gone, those memories of him burying his jeep I have to admit brought a smile of rememberance for me. Him doing that had a profound impact on my decision to take my truck out. I'm sad for his passing but he's left all that knew him with some great stories to tell.
 

WhitePhoenix

Member
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Location
Pensacola, FL
I feel honored that I was able to meet Tigger at the last GA Rally, and we got to talking about him being one of the few Marine Corpsman when he found out I'm in the Navy. I had an instant bond with him and enjoyed talking to him. Truly a good man and will be missed dearly.
 

zout

In Memorial
In Memorial
7,744
154
63
Location
Columbus Georgia
Matt almost always rode with that skeleton in the jeep - a few rallies back a group of use misused "bones" and had a little more fun with it.

The jeep is one of my favorites as when I purchased the jeeps from Doghead a few years back and Matt saw me working on ahhh what 3 of them at one time he decided to dig his out and work on it. He must have been calling me every other day and passing stuff by me to get it up and working. I keep impressing it was not important how it looked it was that it ran and just to have fun in it. He looked forward that year to running it and had a blast in it. When he came back to the rally ground after that burrial in the mud pit you could not wipe the smile off his for for anything - that alone was worth all of his effort to work on it. Watching him have fun was worth all those phone calls getting the jeep there.
The M109 was the start of a whole nother group of phone calls once again - and those memories are all mine and I am not sharing just like the ones at night before the cookouts while we sat around chatting and cooking pig.
 

EMD567

Driver for the Ga Mafia
Steel Soldiers Supporter
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Location
Aiken SC
I remember tigger being so proud that he remembered to shut off the engine before water was ingested. And then the shot of the little jeep pulling a M931(5 ton) towing my M37 out of the woods at the SSGA2013 rally.......
 
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