His father says he's not sure when his son's body will arrive in Bakersfield, but when it does he will be planning the Arlington Virginia Funeral for his son.

The public is invited to take part in services for 21-year-old Specialist Clay Farr this weekend, who was killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq last Sunday.

Specialist Farr will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.

In Bakersfield, there will be a memorial service held Saturday at Valley Baptist Church at 1 p.m.

A graveside service will follow at Hillcrest Memorial Park, where a casket filled with mementos will be buried next to his fiancé, who died in a car crash two years ago.

Two cavalry scouts stationed at Fort Drum were killed when an improvised explosive device or IED struck their vehicle during security patrol in Iraq.

Specialists Joshua U. Humble and Clay P. Farr were both members of A Troop, 1st Squadron, 71st Cavalry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, which is based at Fort Drum. The unit was deployed last August to support military operations in Baghdad.

Humble, 21, a native of Appleton, Maine joined the Army in January 2004 in Portland Maine, he finished his basic training in Fort Knox, Kentucky, and was assigned to the 10th Mountain Division in May of 2005.

Farr, also 21, was from Bakersfield, Calif. Like Humble, he joined the Army in January of 2004, and attended basic and advanced technical training at Fort Knox, Kentucky. In May of last year, Farr was assigned to the 10th Mountain ivision and was deployed in August 2005.

Both soldiers were awarded the Purple Heart, Army Achievement Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Iraq Campaign Medal and the Combat Action Badge.

A third soldier from the same unit suffered shrapnel injuries in the attack.

Benjamin Abel, media relations officer at Fort Drum, did not know the extent of the soldier’s wounds, he said, “I do not believe that they [injuries] would be life threatening.”

Specialist Clay P. Farr decided early on what he wanted to do with his life. He would spend three years in the military, marry his high school sweetheart, then settle down as a sheriff's deputy.

But all that changed in 2004, when his fiancee, Sara Ransom, 16, died in a car accident.

A bugler at Arlington National Cemetery plays taps at the burial of Army Specialist Clay P. Farr, who was killed in Baghdad.

Family members and friends said he never got over the loss. In a letter to his mother, he asked to be buried by her side were he to be killed in Iraq.

Farr, 21, of Bakersfield, California, died February 26, 2006, when a roadside bomb detonated near his Humvee during a patrol in Baghdad. Specialist Joshua U. Humble, 21, of Appleton, Maine, was also killed.

At a memorial service in California two weeks ago, an empty coffin filled with mementos honoring the determined young man was buried beside his fiancee.

"It's what they ultimately wanted," said Regina Ransom, Sara's mother. "They wanted to be together, and they are."

Yesterday, Farr's body was interred at Arlington National Cemetery. He was the 224th person killed supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom to be buried there.

About 50 family members and friends gathered as an Army chaplain delivered the sermon. Afterward, mourners placed bouquets of white roses and orchids beside Farr's coffin.

Farr is survived by his father and stepmother, Patrick and Silver Farr; his brother, Chad Farr; and his mother, Carrol Alderete.

Farr's mother said he was destined for the military. "We knew from an early age that he would be in the service," she said. "He was born with dog tags on."

In kindergarten, camouflage was his favorite color -- until his teacher told him it wasn't a color. In elementary school, he dressed as a soldier for Halloween with face paint from an Army supply store.

Farr also liked to ride BMX bikes and play paintball in the orchard behind his house, recalled friend Austin Brightwell. "We were always outdoors doing something," he said.

At Centennial High School in Bakersfield, Farr was studious and enrolled in a technical theater class. It was in that class he met Sara, whom he would later ask to be his wife.

"All we heard about was him," Regina Ransom said. "There was nobody else for her but Clay."

The two planned to marry after Sara graduated from college. Farr, who volunteered with the Kern County Sheriff's Explorer Unit, was planning a career as a sheriff's deputy. He had talked vaguely of joining the Army, but it wasn't until the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that he became serious about it.

"When he found out there was going to be a war, he realized there was something to be done, and he thought he was one of the people who should be doing it," Brightwell said.

Farr graduated from high school in 2003 and immediately enlisted in the Army as a cavalry scout. He was later assigned to the 1st Squadron, 71st Cavalry, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, at Fort Drum, N.Y. He volunteered for combat duty. His mother said his vehicle had been struck twice by roadside bombs before the attack that took his life.

Farr was a week from returning home on leave when he was killed. His tour of duty in Iraq would have ended in September, but friends and relatives said he was planning to reenlist because he didn't consider the job done.

"Clay loved what he was doing and loved where he was," Brightwell said. "He said it was the most fun thing he'd ever done."

On the day he enlisted in the Army, Clay Farr volunteered to be a cavalry scout.

But his father urged him to "get a job in the back," where his chances for survival would be greater.

 "He told me, 'I'm going to be in the action, Dad. I'm getting on the front line,' " Patrick Farr said.

Even as a youngster, Clay Farr seemed destined for the military life, his father said. In school, he liked to color everything in camouflage patterns.

"Clay was all Army from the time he was small," his father said, recalling a photograph of his then-4-year-old son wearing a camouflage ball cap at an air show. "That's when the Army got him."

The 21-year-old Bakersfield native enlisted after graduating from Centennial High School in 2003 and asked to go to Iraq.

On February 26, 2006, Farr was one of two soldiers killed when a roadside bomb exploded near their Humvee while they were on patrol in Baghdad. Also killed was Army Specislist Joshua U. Humble, 21, of Appleton, Maine. Both were assigned to the 1st Squadron, 71st Cavalry, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum, New York.

Joining the Army was part of Farr's bigger plan: After the war, he was going to marry his high-school sweetheart and become a Kern County sheriff's deputy, his parents said.

In high school, Farr rode around Bakersfield in boots and camouflage dungarees as he and his friends scouted areas such as the almond orchard across from their high school to play paintball or jump their BMX bikes, said one of his best friends, Jared Russell, 20.

Farr also joined the Explorer Scouts and rode along with sheriff's deputies nearly every weekend, preferring to patrol the city's east side because "that's where the action is," Russell said.

After graduation, he worked as a security guard at a hospital and shopping mall.

On the day before boot camp, Farr reunited with his mother, Carrol Alderete. He insisted that she meet his fiancee, Sara Ransom, 16.

Three weeks later, Sara was killed in a car accident.

"Clay was totally in love," Alderete said. "It was just like a fairy tale."

Farr returned home to bury his fiancee but didn't stay. He turned down the Army's offer to take a few months off before returning to boot camp. He told his mother, "It was part of our plan, and I'm just going to stick with it," she said.

In an April 2004 letter, Farr promised Alderete that he would be careful. "Mom, you have a no-fear son, but I know when I've gone too far, and I'll stop before I get hurt," he wrote.

His father said he had a bad feeling. His son's Humvee had been hit by roadside bombs twice in two weeks. Farr was not injured the first time, but was hospitalized with a concussion a week later, on Feb. 19, his 21st birthday.

Despite those close calls, Farr told his father that he had decided to reenlist.

"He said, 'Well, my job's not done here, Dad, and I can't leave because if we don't finish this thing over here….' He guaranteed me that those insurgents would be in our backyards,' " Patrick Farr said.

If Clay Farr was not scared for his safety, his father was. "After the second bomb hit, I told my wife something's wrong," Patrick Farr recalled. "I said we need to prepare ourselves, something is about to happen."

A week later, his son was killed. Alderete said she has been told since her son's death that he usually drove the Humvee but was not behind the wheel Feb. 26 because of his head injury. The driver survived, she said.

Farr was awarded two Purple Hearts and a Bronze Star. He was buried March 14 at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.

Next to Sara's grave in Bakersfield, Farr's father also buried a coffin filled with stuffed animals, clothes, photographs and other mementos from friends and family.

"I know he's in heaven," Alderete said. "I know he's with Sara."

In addition to his parents, Farr is survived by a brother, Chad; his stepmother, Silver Farr; his stepfather, Anthony Alderete; and two stepsisters, Amanda Cope and Taylor Alderete.

Patrick Farr places his hand on his son's casket during Arlington National Cemetery burial honors 
for Specialist Clay Patrick Farr, 21, of Bakersfield, California, who is the 224th person killed in Operation Iraqi Freedom to be buried at Arlington

FARR, CLAY PATRICK
SPC   US ARMY
DATE OF BIRTH: 02/19/1985
DATE OF DEATH: 02/26/2006
BURIED AT: SECTION 60  SITE 8321
ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY

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