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LANCE Cpl. Aaron W. Simons of Modesto was the latest soldier killed in action to be honored on the "In Remembrance" Web site the other day.
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A photograph of the handsome 20-year-old in uniform, an obituary and pages upon pages of tributes from friends, family, military buddies and long lost childhood pals are posted on the site.

Simons died April 24, in Al Anbar province, Iraq. A member of the First Battalion, 7th Marine Regimental Combat Team of the U.S. Marine Corp, Simons died during a rocket attack of his base at al Qaim, Iraq.

As traditions like Memorial Day mix with our Internet-based way of life these days, this site honoring the 2,688 U.S. service men and women who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan since the current conflicts began, or since 2002, is receiving lots of traffic. Hosted on the Legacy.com obituary Web site at http://www.legacy.com/soldiers.asp, this site and a couple others like it honoring U.S. soldiers killed in action offer an Internet age way to honor our fallen soldiers. Like the blogging phenomenon that has taken over the Web generally, these sites offer a way for memorial passages to be posted by many.

"Aaron, you will be missed so very dearly by all your Buds," begins one tribute to Simons among scores and scores of guest book entries on "In Remembrance." They describe him as a guitar player, a thoughtful teacher to younger people and a friend to many.

"I would never have learned anything about music if it weren't for Aaron," another tribute reads. And one of many from other military parents reads, "My son Justin served with Aaron. He said he was one of his best friends, as I'm sure he was to many."

John Bikus, one of the "In Remembrance" site designers and chief marketing officer at Legacy.com, said the

Walt Kolbe visits an old friend's gravestone at the Golden Gate National Veterans' Cemetery. (Michelle Le/staff)

intent was to let the real people behind the names be portrayed. Legacy.com partners with 270 U.S. newspapers (including the Oakland Tribune) to provide online editions of the newspapers' obituaries. The newspapers also supply the obituary information for In Remembrance.

"You can go to a lot of sites and find out who was killed but this helps you find out more about the person, the real person behind the name, and their family," Bikus said. It has become a popular site to visit among military families.

In Remembrance was among five nominees for a 2006 International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences Webby Award for creating a community, although it didn't win.

Those traits are also why Orland resident Lori Moreno finds comfort in the site. Moreno lost her son Sgt. Harvey E. Parkerson III in 2004 to a roadside land mine. Parkerson, a member of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, was inspecting a roadside land mine when it was detonated by remote control.

"It has meant a lot to me. It helps to just go back and look at it," Moreno said. "A lot of people are still writing in, letting his family know how proud they are of our son." It has also allowed her to meet other military families sharing similar grief, and it has given Parkerson's 8-year-old son a place to write to his dad.

FallenHeroesMemorial.com is another site honoring U.S. service men and women killed in action by providing a place for people to write tributes. Created by a 24-year-old while his older brother was in Iraq, FallenHeroesMemorial.com also has attracted pages and pages of tributes.

Neither Web site is political. In fact, Legacy.com staff reads all the tributes that come in to the In Remembrance site to screen out political agendas or inappropriate messages. Tim Rivera, who operates FallenHeroesMemorial, screens all of the tributes it receives.

That said, the entries are sometimes endearingly personal.

Lance Cpl. Simons, for example, was remembered in the online guest book by an Ames, Iowa, woman who had moved away from Modesto years ago but had always hoped to find Simons, a high school sweetheart, again. She likely would not have found out of his death in Ames.

Another tribute to Simons starts, "Hi Aaron. I know you won't remember me because you were only a toddler the last time I saw you, but I remember you, very well. In fact it was a church camp out to Bass Lake when I was 12. You walked right up to me, hugged me, picked up a pebble from the dirt and gently placed it in the palm of my hand. You whispered in my ear, 'hold on to it and don't lose it,' and that's exactly what I did," writes Anji Briton of Modesto.

Another is from the aunt of a U.S. marine who was with Simons when he died, a Wisconsin woman who also likely would not get to the funeral or have a chance to sign a family guest book.

Legacy.com is owned by several investor groups, the largest of which is the publisher of the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times, known as the Tribune Co.

Business Writer Barbara Grady can be reached at (510) 208-6427 or bgrady@angnewspapers.com.

Copyright © 2006. ANG Newspapers.