In Bedford, a special honor roll

“It’s right at the spot outside the high school where kids wait for rides,’’ she said. “When John was a student this was just a parking lot, but now it’s a paved area with benches, and memorial markers around the flagpole.

“As kids are waiting for their parents to pick them up, they’ll have a chance to stand by the plaques and read the names. And I’m sure it will give them all a moment to think about their own futures, and what they might do when they get out of high school.’’

Private First Class John Hart was killed in an ambush near Kirkuk, Iraq, in 2003. A year later, another Bedford graduate, Marine Lance Corporal Travis Desiato, died in action in Iraq’s El Anbar province.

With nearly a quarter of the students at Bedford High coming from families with ties to nearby Hanscom Air Force Base, students, teachers, and administrators at the school are keenly aware of the sacrifices of military life. But when Hart and Desiato died in rapid succession, it hit the school community hard. Both had graduated only recently, and teachers, students, and former students knew them well.

So when plans for a $51 million renovation project at the high school shifted into high gear about two years ago, principal Jon Sills started working on including in the design a war memorial honoring the high school’s fallen alumni.

The memorial — four granite posts around the flagpole, each with a plaque describing one of the men — will honor Hart and Desiato and two Bedford High graduates who were killed in Vietnam: Terry Reed and Robson Wills. The school opened in the mid-1950s, and these four are the only alumni to die defending their country. The location is particularly symbolic because, as a member of the school’s Junior ROTC, Hart on most mornings had the job of raising the flag.

At the dedication today, family members, students, teachers, administrators, town officials, and residents will gather to offer tribute to the four men.

Each one will be remembered by a designated representative: for Willis and Reed, friends will speak for them; for Hart and Desiato, it will be their fathers.

The national anthem will be played, and the Junior ROTC will raise the flag.

Sills said many people in town pitched in to make the memorial a reality.

“It was important to us to make this a community-owned project,’’ said Sills. “So we did a lot of fund-raising to give individuals and organizations in the community an opportunity to contribute. In doing so, we raised about $40,000. Other funds were earmarked for this project as part of the overall site work for the high school construction.

“Over the past year it has really come together,’’ the school’s principal said.

Terry Reed’s sister, Bonnie Reed Gallogly, who lives outside San Francisco now, said she was moved to hear that her brother would be remembered in Bedford so many years later.

“I think it is a very nice thing that they are doing,’’ she said. “I am grateful to the community for taking this interest in my brother.’’

Dr. Joseph Desiato will be one of the speakers this afternoon, remembering his son.

“I think that Bedford High School, the faculty and the community, has been tremendously supportive to our family,’’ he said. “This memorial plaza is a fantastic effort by the community to help remember these four men. We are extremely appreciative of this.

“Any time Travis is thought about or remembered, we appreciate it greatly, because it’s the way we continue to believe Travis lives on.’’