By the Major Brent Taylor Foundation and Jenny Goldsberry

Tyler Adams

Tyler Adams spend eight years in the Army as a medic. His training included six additional months in Fort Sam in Houston after boot camp. He’d decided to serve after his experience as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Australia. He was living there during 9/11, and saw hoards of cab drivers parked near the train station with their radios on. Whenever the death toll of the terrorist attack was updated, they all cheered and celebrated. Tyler decided to enlist to understand the conflict better.

He met and married his wife Kelly at church in Colorado, where he was stationed at Fort Carson the entirety of his service. Then he deployed to Mosul, Iraq from 2007 to 2009. There he met and worked alongside the late Brent Taylor. As Tyler was in the middle of a search and seizure, a car bomb exploded wounding him. He returned to southern Iraq afterwards, and retired from the service in North Ogden to find Brent Taylor as his mayor.

Today he has two boys and works for Black Rifle Coffee Company. He’s happy to see the extent the community has gone to thank the troops, especially following the passing of Major Brent Taylor.

Dave Havel

Dave’s dad served 28 years in the Marine Corps which inspired him to enlist in the Air Force straight out of high school. He’s been serving for 21 years now and according to his wife Raychel, there’s no one else in the branch that loves his job more than Dave loves his as a weapons troop.

He met Raychel while based at Luke Air Force Base after nearly ten years of service. Together they have two kids. They moved to the area in 2019 after starting and raising their family in Arizona. It was the peak snowstorm right before Thanksgiving, yet as soon as they pulled into the snowy driveway, their neighbor across the street got out to help unload their boxes. 

Dave spent three deployments to Afghanistan and recently returned from one in Jordan among others. He was welcomed home with a police escort and dozens of American flags waving him in. They are set to move to South Dakota later this year. However, they have found it so welcoming that they’re considering retiring here among their neighbors who have shown them kindness these last two years.

Are you a military member in the North Ogden area? Do you know one? Submit nominations to be featured in the magazine at https://www.connectionpub.com/military.html