PFC Caesar Viglienzone

Caesar Samuel Viglienzone was born on September 10, 1984 at Kapiolani Womens’ and Childrens’ Hospital in Honolulu. After tours in Rhode Island and D.C. we returned to Hawaii in 1989.

Caesar loved his time both at Navy Hale Keiki School and living in Makalapa housing near Pearl Harbor. Those were carefree days, spent mostly outside adventuring. He loved exploring…going through lava tubes, tunnels, up trees, anywhere and everywhere. His favorite beaches were Yokohama Beach and Sharks Cove.  He learned to play a recorder. He played his first soccer in Hawaii as well as T Ball and basketball. Reading was a special part of every day from birth.

A special memory I have is of a picture on the Ft Campbell Family Readiness website of a soldier sitting on the front hood of his Humvee (presumably waiting for orders to get moving) and reading a newspaper….that soldier was my son. My immediate thought was of the gift that Hale Keiki gave our son and us.

In 1993 we moved to Santa Rosa in California and to the civilian world. It was a big change for Caesar. He continued playing soccer for a number of years.

The summer before his sophomore year of high school Caesar went on an Outward Bound course in Colorado and excelled at it. There was lots of hiking, river rafting, ropes courses and so on – all ways in which Caesar liked to challenge himself.  Caesar started diving for Abalone with his Dad and his Uncles when he was about 13. Again, he liked the physical challenge of snorkel and mask diving to depth and trying to get an ‘ab’.

At the end of high school, in 2003, Caesar determined that he would not go to college until he figured out what he wanted from that experience. A year after graduation our son decided to enlist in the Army. In October 2004 Caesar was in Basic Training at Fort Benning in Georgia and finished up there in February 2005. He headed to his new home at Fort Campbell in Kentucky. Before his deployment to Iraq, Caesar earned his Eagle Responder Certificate. During the summer of 2005 we spent time camping at the back of the Base and enjoyed an extended visit with our son – a very special time for the three of us. He talked about what he was thinking of doing when he got out of the Army - going to college for a degree and then going back into the Army as a helicopter pilot.

Caesar left for Iraq in October 2005. We talked on the phone when he could and were looking forward to his mid-tour leave coming in March of 2006. On February 1, 2006 Caesar, First LT Garrison Avery, and SPC Marlon Bustamante were killed in action by a roadside bomb.