COLLEGE STATION ? Chris Northcliffe was remembered Saturday as a kind and creative spirit who lived happily and abhorred the sort of violence that randomly claimed his life.
"I cannot come up with a memory of Chris, outside of a funeral, where he was not smiling," said longtime friend Terry Wooten at Northcliffe's memorial service. "He was always happy. He was always smiling. I don't know what the secret was, but he knew it."
A service for Brazos County Constable Brian Bachmann was at 2 p.m. Saturday at Reed Arena.
One of the victims of Thomas Alton Caffall's inexplicable shooting spree Monday in a neighborhood near the campus of Texas A&M University, Northcliffe drew a packed sanctuary of mourners to Our Saviour's Luthern Church.
His widow, Christy, and two children heard him remembered as a talented artist who could dash off an impressive watercolor with little effort, and a committed friend who never burned a bridge.
"Chris never lost his interest in life," Wooten said. "He treated his entire life as a fun adventure. If we could all learn from him, the world would be a better place."
Northcliffe, 51, owned a rental house near the one occupied by Caffall and was walking down the street to meet a contractor when Caffall began shooting. Northcliffe was almost a block away from Caffall's residence when he was hit by a bullet from an assault rifle.
The Rev. Erich Schaefer said Northcliffe's death, senseless as it was, inspires a question that has been asked since man's earliest days.
"How is it that an innocent man, a beloved father and friend, is shot and killed in the prime of life?" Schaefer asked. "This is not the way it is supposed to be. How can this happen? I ask, where is God? These are questions we have always asked in the face of violence. It is the ancient question of the human heart. God is here, weeping, just as he was weeping at the tomb of Lazarus. Look around you today. Jesus is weeping with you."
mike.tolson@chron.com
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