Community mourns loss of 3 teens with vigil in Tampico

TAMPICO – Hundreds of mourners packed the Tampico Community Center gymnasium Sunday night for a vigil for three teens who were killed Thursday in a crash just outside the village.

Jayden Lee Hanson and Channing Swertfeger, both 14, and 16-year-old Douglas “DJ” Dorathy died when the pickup they were riding in collided with a semi at the intersection of Hahnaman and Luther roads.

After Amazing Grace was played, Tampico Mayor Bruce Peltier started the ceremony by speaking of the closeness of the small town.

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Lights from phones and flashlights illuminate the Tampico Community Center Sunday, March 31, 2024 during a vigil for three local teens who died in a Thursday collision. (Alex T. Paschal)

“There’s no way I can validate this tragedy,” Peltier said. He then spoke of how well the young people have come together and showed strength and poise in the face of such terrible adversity.

Prophetstown-Lyndon-Tampico School District Superintendent Heidi Lensing spoke about grief and sorrow, but also about not letting go of hope and finding a way to move forward, through kindness and compassion.

After a playing of “The Boys of Fall” by Kenny Chesney, Yorktown Church of Christ Pastor Isaac Newman delivered prayers and thanks to the first responders and the hardships they, too, endured.

Tears flowed as longtime classmates and close friends of the boys stepped up to speak of their loss and express the unbelievable thought of no longer having their friends with them.

At the end of the hour-long ceremony, Newman offered this advice: “Mourn for them, but also speak their names. It may be hard, but there will also be joy.”

Services for the three boys will be held this week.

Visitation for DJ, a sophomore, will be held from 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday at Garland Funeral Home in Tampico, with graveside services at 11 a.m. Wednesday at St. Mary Cemetery.

Visitation for Channing and Jayden will be held from 4 to 7 p.m. Wednesday at Prophetstown Middle School. Channing’s funeral service the next day is private.

Jayden’s funeral begins at 10 a.m. Thursday at Prophetstown United Methodist Church. Participants also are being invited to take part in a vehicle procession for Jayden.

Jayden loved anything on wheels – race cars, dirt bikes, four-wheelers, trucks, tractors, you name it. The 14-year-old also loved anything to do with farming, especially all things John Deere.

“You’d be struggling to find somebody bigger into farming. That was his purpose in life, I’d guess you’d say,” his uncle Chad Anderson said Sunday.

To honor that boisterous, infectious love that was so much a part of Jayden’s life, Anderson is organizing a procession of vehicles after his funeral Thursday at Prophetstown United Methodist Church.

Jayden’s dad, Austin Hanson, is a crew member for his best friend, Sterling race car driver Dustin Schram, and while not farmers themselves, the Hansons come from farmers, and Austin still helps out in the local farming community, Anderson said.

Jayden always was by his dad’s side, so racing and farming was the life he grew up in, a life he loved.

All the area farmers knew him, Anderson said, and Jayden, a freshman, belonged to Prophetstown High School’s FFA club.

Anderson is asking anyone who can “to show up Thursday with all the cool stuff” at Birkey’s Farm Store, 200 North St., where store manager Jay Von Holten will have cleared the lot to allow those joining the procession to park, unload their vehicles and get organized.

Hundreds are expected, so participants should show up well before 10 a.m.

The vehicles will travel over to the church, and then head to Riverside Cemetery after the 10 a.m. service, about 11 a.m., when Jayden will arrive, driven by his dad, Anderson said.

Prophetstown police and fire will be involved, with blocks around the church and along the route to the cemetery blocked off, along Second Street and Star Road, as needed.

Go to garlandfuneralhomes.com for the boys’ obituaries, and to send condolences.

“As can be expected, although not seriously physically injured, the boy who was driving the pickup is in a bad way, and can’t at the moment see that the miracle of his survival should be celebrated, and gives hope to us all,” Anderson said.

“If there’s anything that I would want to say to him, and I feel I can speak for all of our families, if there’s anything that that young man can do, it’s live,” Anderson said. “You were the one who survived, and now you have to live, for your friends.”