First off, Jedidiah Wildman, an E-2 in the US Army, currently resides in Ft. Campbell, KY.  He was born on 4 OCT 77.  He is about 5'-9" tall and weighs about 150 lbs.  He has very dark brown hair, and only wears shorts from 6am to 7:45am in the morning.  Jed graduated from Mazama High School in 1996, and shortly afterward joined the US Army.  He seems to believe that he is "The most High-Speed Private in the whole damn Army."  He also fancies himself as "150 lbs of twisted steel and sex appeal."

<=======NOT Jed.

He is in the 101st Airborne Division (Screaming Eagles), the 502nd Infantry regiment (Strike Brigade Task Force), 3rd Battalion (Widowmakers).  He delivers ammunition and explosives of all types, small arms:  5.56, 7.62, 50 caliber and many other small arms, grenades of all sorts, mortar rounds, Mines and Fuses, M203 ammunition, High explosives when needed (C-4, Semtex, etc.) although he won't have to transport C-4 or any of that stuff until combat.  He is the Ammo Chief's driver, so he is kept busy.

His niece was attacked by a german sheppard and she is going to be scarred for the rest of her life, and his grandfather's bother (grand-uncle?) died of a stroke.

He lived in Richmond and San Antonio, both in California.  He thought that they were pretty neat, although he was young, so they most certainly changed since then.  Mike never visited Candlestick Park, even though he was born in Oakland.  When he was two years old, his family shipped of to Brunswick, a town with a terrible paper mill in Georgia.  Wood comments: "The stench was horrid."   He also lived in Florida and New York, and he didn't like Florida one bit because "it was hotter than Hell, and extremely humid, too."  Wood didn't like the Atlantic either, because it was so polluted and dirty, especially to a biologist.  He liked moving all over the place because "you could raise all hell and make a bad reputation for yourself, then just move away and start all over again on a clean slate."

Here's an interesting story about him when he was 8:  He and a friend, both Navy BRATS, were playing around on the Naval Base.  They saw a Nautilus Class nuclear submarine, and decided to investigate.  While they were sneaking around inside the sub, some Marine MPs found them.  The MPs didn't say a word, they just shuffled their automatic weapons off to a side, grabbed the boys, took them and threw them in a windowless room, and locked the door.  Wood's friend's dad just happened to be the C/O of the ship, so he told the Marines to just leave them in the brig and let them simmer for a couple of hours.  Let us just say that he was very frightened.

He attended three high schools divided among the states of New York, Georgia, and Florida.  During Wood's freshman and sophomore years in New York his dad was stationed in Monterey, so he had to live there too.  He says that people in New York may seem mean and petulant at first, but if you get to know them they become very good, loyal friends.  Wood went to two other high schools, one in Georgia and the other in Florida.  He didn't like moving around a lot once he got into high school due to the strains it puts on friendships and the hardships you go through when you move away from all of your friends.

Wood was also a very athletic person, lettering in track and cross country four times each,  soccer, wrestling, and football each once.  He played football for a year and a half.  He says he did sports because they provided a quick way to gain friends, which was essential considering how often he moved.  He liked the sports also because they were very fun, and because of the respect you get when you do so many.  He ran distance in track.

Wood went to the University of Florida, Georgia State University, and Kennesaw State University.  He got his B.S. in natural selection from Kennesaw State.  His final cumulative GPA was 4.0, and he was required to go through Differential Equations, commonly called "Diffy Q's," in mathematics.

Wood and his step-brother were amateur entertainers off and on for ten years in the Southeast.  Wood played the guitar, and they both sang.  They played easy listening and occasionally did solos, and did this in Atlanta, Georgia, and in Florida for about five years each.  That was how he met his wife.

He met her in a restaurant/lounge while entertaining on 27 Dec 76.  The line he used on her was:  "Do you always smile like that or is it just the light?"  It was obviously successful because they got married in April of 1977.  He stopped entertaining then and rarely moved, and then only from house to house, apartment to apartment, etceteras.  Wood believes that people in the Southwest are "lazier," calmer, more polite, and laid back because they've been like that for centuries due to the immense summer heat.

He worked as a Sci-Tech, Physics, and Biology (in 1987-88) teacher in Atlanta, as well as coaching his very first year teaching, in 1986.

He and his wife moved here, to Klamath Falls, about five years ago because their daughter, Jessica, was born on 25 Jun 87 and they didn't want to bring her up in a city like Atlanta.  He chose here because he has relatives living here, and he visited them quite often (every summer) when he was young.  According to Wood, this city didn't change much, other than the addition of another high school, in the past forty years.

When he moved here, he got a job coaching for the Mazama Distance Track Team, in 1991.  Ever since then he has been coaching at Mazama, and making obsidian knives to sell in the region.

He likes how hard the people in Klamath Falls try to achieve their goals, and likes the easy accessible outdoors, among other things. 

He enjoys reading many of the books I myself do, of which you can see a brief sysnopsis of them here.  He also enjoys computing, playing AD&D, listening to Weezer, and playing the bass guitar which he "borrowed" from the school.

Casey and his friend Elijah Bunnel are hoping to start a band whose name has yet to be determined which would probably emulate Weezer in some way, shape, or form.

Casey plays 4 instruments in his high school band classes including the trumpet, tuba, and bariton.

Please e-mail me with any questions or comments. 

This page and contents property of Brian Voils, copyright June 1997.