Hundreds Gather for Funeral of Teen Who Died While Train-Hopping

It was standing room only at the open-casket funeral of Chris Hanson, the Columbia Heights High School sophomore who .

Three to four hundred of Hanson’s friends, classmates and relatives gathered at the Washburn-McReavy funeral home in Columbia Heights, with mourners filling the lobby and flowing out into the street.

Hanson was remembered throughout the service as a light-hearted teen, unusually empathetic and devoted to his family.

The 15-year-old was train-hopping on Feb. 26 with friends. After he stayed on a train when a friend jumped off, his body was found in northeast Minneapolis. .

During the funeral, his sister Mariah read a poem titled Christopher and written by her uncle, Reed Sprung.

“The Kids Were Just Doing/ What All of Us Try/ When We’re Fifteen and We Know/ We’ll Never Die,” she read. “They Went Down To The Tracks/ They Went For a Ride/ Now One Lives in Heaven/ Two Died Deep Inside.”

The poem was followed by a remembrance ceremony during which friends and neighbors shared their memories of Hanson.

A neighbor recalled how the first time she met Hanson, he and his sister were throwing sticks through her open front door into her living room.

“I just wished he had talked to the hobos in my home,” she said. “They would definitely have talked him out of riding the rails. I don’t know how many times he rode, but he’ll forever be in the hearts of the hobos for doing something maybe stupid, but adventurous.”

A friend of Hanson remembered his unremittingly upbeat attitude.

“The first time I met Chris, he shook my hand and said, ‘What’s going on, boss?’” he said.

Concluding the service, Hanson’s pastor, Lee Ormiston, spoke on religious themes.

“While we can’t understand why Christ died,” he said, “we have to understand that it was his time.”

The service was followed by an interment at the Sunset Funeral Home and Cemetery in northeast Minneapolis.

A second candlelight vigil in Hanson's memory is set for Sunday, Feb. 26, 3–8 p.m. at Huset Park in Columbia Heights. (Another vigil took place in Minneapolis last Sunday. and .)

Reed Sprung's poem Christopher, read by Mariah Hanson:

Everyone Loved Him;
But He Said “Let’s Go”;
Nobody Was Ready;
How Could They Know?
The Kids Were Just Doing;
What All of Us Try;
When We’re Fifteen and We Know;
We’ll Never Die;
They Went Down To The Tracks;
They Went For a Ride;
Now One Lives in Heaven;
Two Died Deep Inside;
His Sisters, His Parents;
His Family, His Friends;
He Wants Them to Know;
He’ll See Them Again;
‘til Then They’ll Remember;
The Things He Went Through;
He’ll Live Forever;
Just as Long As They Do.