Community grieves for Lucas O'Connor

By Nathan Mayberg
GOSHEN — Lucas O'Connor was an honor student and an Eagle Scout who had hoped to become a veterinarian. But his life and his plans ended suddenly last week, two days after a horrific car accident in Warwick.

Lucas was the third Goshen High School student to die in the crash involving a Decat driving school vehicle that was part of summer driver's education course at his school.

According to an obituary from the family, he died on Thursday, July 16, at Westchester Medical Center. He was 16 years old.

Lucas' love for animals led him to volunteer this summer at the Middletown office of veterinarian Dr. Paul Johnson. Johnson said Lucas was doing community service so that he could join the National Honor Society. Lucas shadowed Johnson for three to four hours a day on Saturdays.

"He was a good kid, doing all the right things for all the right reasons," Johnson said.

Last year, Lucas followed his love for animals to Noah's Park Retreat, an animal rescue organization in Goshen, where he also volunteered.

Co-founder Diana McGowan said Lucas, with help from his father, helped rebuild a portion of the facility last summer as part of his Eagle Scout project.

McGowan said Lucas was a "very bright boy. He seemed to have a very loving relationship with his father."

He helped renovate the top floor of the children's arc with carpentry and painting work, she said. The arc is where children can go to see the animals. This year, Lucas had planned to do fencing work at the nonprofit center.

An emotional Johnson described Lucas as "a pretty quiet child," but also "astute."

"He wasn't the type of child who would have interrupted you in the middle of something," Johnson said.

More than 400 mourners attended Lucas' funeral on Wednesday. A long line led from where his body rested in the sanctuary at Grace Community Church in Washingtonville and continued out the door.

Friends, classmates, school employees, and other community members came to comfort the family and pay their respects.

Some mourners in the overflow crowd observed the funeral on a television in another room.

Lucas was remembered as somebody who liked religious music and stood up for his sisters. He was a state Science Olympiad champion and, by the second grade, could read at the college level.

He was said to be his dad's best friend and "his mother's heart."

"He especially loved his Labrador," said Pastor Jarrod Jones.

A track and cross-country runner, he worked up to the rank of Eagle, the highest rank in Boy Scouts. About two dozen of his fellow scouts from Troop 62 in Goshen came to say good-bye.

Whatever accomplishments Lucas had attained with Grasso in scouting, they were outweighed by what he had done since, Grasso said, in an apparent reference to Lucas being an organ donor.

Jones said Lucas' organ donations helped save the lives of five people.

"Luke gave more than any scout ever could," said Scoutmaster Mike Grasso. "There is no more precious gift that you can give than life."

Reporter Nathan Mayberg can be reached at 845-469-9000 ext. 359 or by email at comm.reporter@strausnews.com