Friends, Family Remember Rue '17 Through Her Own Words

Friends and family of Haley A. Rue ’17, who died this summer while traveling in Germany, packed Memorial Church and Annenberg Hall on Thursday night for an evening in memoriam.

Between verses of scripture, hymns, and remembrances, Rue’s own writing emerged as the focal point of the service. Before her death, Rue spent the summer travelling Europe for Let’s Go, and writing regularly for its blog. She had also posted to a personal blog called “Those Last Five Pounds.”

By Tiana A Abdulmassih

Standing together at a podium in the church’s nave, members of Rue’s blocking group recited Rue’s recollection of her Harvard admissions interview, during which Rue said she told her alumni interviewer that “if I could do anything with my life, money not being an object, I would be a nomad. I would not cure anything, discover anything, win anything. I would travel and write.”

When Rue was accepted and received a note from her interviewer advising her that “with a Harvard degree, you may very well become the chief of a nomadic peoples,” she recalled being overcome.

“This sentiment overwhelmed me with so much happiness that I cried,” wrote Rue, who was also a Crimson arts editor. “For some reason, I feel like this story explains me. I am pretty weird and often times very boldly so.”

In addition to Rue’s writings, the service touched on the many groups on campus in which she played a central role, from her roommates, blockmates, and entryway mates to her fellow writers from Let’s Go, a Harvard Student Agencies company that produces travel guides. Several of Rue’s friends played musical selections as well.

“From the moment Haley walked into the Let’s Go office, she brought an incredible sense of kindness and love for life that made me want to instantly get to know her better,” said Keyanna Y. Wigglesworth ’16, who worked with Rue at the publication and was flanked at the podium by other Let’s Go writers and editors.

“The reason why we were all so honored to have worked with Haley is because she had such a unique way of bringing people together and of bringing us together. And that’s what she did this summer,” Wigglesworth added.

Later in the service, the tears momentarily subsided when Meg P. Bernhard ’17 introduced a montage of videos Rue had produced with friends as well as photos of Rue throughout her life.

“Haley, as we all know, was silly, generous, glamorous, sparkling, and utterly joyful, and this video captures this beautifully,” Bernhard, a Crimson news editor, said as some in the audience began to laugh knowingly. “In these videos she was, of course, inevitably the star.”

The montage captured Rue from her baby pictures all the way through her valedictory speech at Mount Rainier Lutheran High School in Washington, her freshman year at Harvard, and her travels this summer.

After the montage and before the audience processed with candles to Annenberg Hall to write notes of remembrance, the crowd quieted for brief words from Haley’s father, Warren Starks.

“Haley truly believed in two things that I knew of: her faith and her friendship.... Haley really believed in friendship. Haley loved all of you. Haley loved this University.” Starks said, fighting through tears. “Haley wrote in a letter that when God was ready for her to go, it was the right time. But no time was the right time for me.”

—Staff writer Matthew Q. Clarida can be reached at matthew.clarida@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @mattclarida.