Patrick Stittleburg, for example: "If you had a blueprint of a person you kind of wanted to model yourself after, of a father or a husband or a friend, John would be that blueprint."

Stittleburg is the vice president of the State Bank of Cazenovia. He went to Weston High School with Klang more than 30 years ago. He played fast- pitch softball with Klang - a slick-fielding third baseman - on a team sponsored by the local feed mill, owned by Klang's father, Don. Their sons played baseball together on the high school team.

And this, from Melissa Nigh: "He was compassionate, towards his staff and his students. He had a rapport with the kids. He cared. His heroic efforts Friday were a prime example. What I will miss about him most is his just being there, his presence. He was a role model who did not impose that on other people."

Nigh is the dean of students at Weston, a fifth-grade teacher, athletic director, volleyball coach, and was being mentored by Klang to become a principal.

'Liked all students'

Heroic. A model. An educator who put students first. Someone who could be counted on to help, to lead, to resolve. A husband who liked to walk in the woods. A father who was fair.

"He liked all students," Nigh said. "Every student was important to him. Any conflicts he may have had with them, I don't think he ever favored one type of student over another."

Police say Klang, 49, was shot to death by a student who came to Weston High School on Friday morning armed with a shotgun and a handgun. A custodian, Dave Thompson, was able to take the shotgun away. Klang took over the struggle and was shot three times with the handgun. At the end of the struggle he swept the handgun away from the student, away from all the students, down the hallway floor.

Klang's life begins and ends in the same place: Cazenovia, a village with a population of 398 in 1906 and fewer than 400 today.

"The reason he stayed," said Stittleburg, "is best summed up by saying he loved the people here."

Terry Milfred's job was down to one day a week, thanks to Klang. Milfred, a retired school superintendent, was coaxed out of retirement several years ago to become a "temporary" superintendent at Weston, where, not coincidentally, he also went to high school. The last couple of years he was Klang's mentor, moving him along into what would have this spring become the superintendent's job.

"I was impressed with him because he was a listener," recalled Milfred, who called Klang's death "devastating."

Perfect fit

Klang was uniquely suited for the job. He had seen the school district and the community from all sides. After he graduated high school in 1975, he went to UW-La Crosse. After college - and marriage to his high school sweetheart, Sue Adelman - he taught for a year in Adams-Friendship. He then returned to rural Cazenovia with Sue to become a dairy farmer on the Adelman family farm. He was elected to the School Board, became board president, and decided to become an educator.

Farming would not provide enough income to pay for putting two daughters and a son through college. Besides, Klang's back was sore and getting worse. Amish neighbors milked the cows while he taught as a substitute and gathered the credits necessary to resume teaching.

He became athletic director at Weston at the same time as he was principal at tiny St. Anthony's Catholic School in Germantown. Eventually, many of the people he helped hire when he was board president, became his colleagues after he earned an advanced degree in administration and became principal at Weston.

"It was exciting to keep a good person in the district," said Milfred. "When he said he was interested in the principal's job, I jumped at the chance to tell the School Board they were getting a good person. He was not some young guy just getting some experience before moving on, and not some old guy who was ending up a career."

Klang was a perfect fit because he wanted to be right where he was.

"The guy, when you were at school, he was visible, doing something all the time," said Bill Nigh, the school's softball coach, a part-time teacher and husband of Melissa Nigh.

"He was just always there. If you had a question, he either answered it or found you an answer. He was with the kids all the time. Friday morning he stopped in the sixth-grade classroom before school, my son Zach was there. He also stopped by the science classroom. He was not unreachable to anyone," Bill Nigh said.

'Wanted to give more'

Klang handled stress by walking in the woods, said Milfred.

"That was his classical music, walking in the woods," he said.

He shared that sort of music with Sue. They started dating when they were in high school. She was 16. They both hunted and fished, and both liked taking walks in the woods, she said.

Klang was not as certain about his skills as the people who praised them.

"He was worried when he first got in there (as principal), that he wouldn't be able to handle it," recalled Stittleburg. "I told him he would be just fine, give yourself a chance. And he was. He was the glue that kept everything together."

No one could recall seeing Klang upset or angry, and Melissa Nigh, who has been at the school for 18 years, said Klang was not the sort of person to raise his voice.

"He didn't yell or scream, he didn't raise his voice with the kids. He talked with them and did what he had to do. He was not a boisterous type."

Nor was he flamboyant, in dress or speech, she said. In fact, Friday was the first time Klang ever showed up "casual" for "casual Friday."

"He was wearing a brand new Weston school polo shirt, it was royal blue. He really wasn't a suit kind of guy," she said.

Sue Klang said: "He always wanted to appear correctly. He had been in places where teachers would wear old jeans and a T-shirt. He didn't think that was right. For someone to respect you, you had to be able to relate that respect from the inside out."

John Frizzell, who now teaches at Wisconsin Dells, taught at Weston for three years, and coached Klang's son, Derek, in football and baseball, and taught Klang's youngest daughter, Kerri, in class. Frizzell, too, was hired by Klang when Klang was school board president.

"I guess I remember most his integrity," said Frizzell.

"It stands out above everything else. It is very rare in today's society, in education, to find a person who dedicates his life to one school, to one building. This was a man who was born and raised there. Went to school there. Was on the School Board. Saw his children go through the system and realized he wanted to give more," said Frizzell.

"The atmosphere John created was one of a student- centered learning community. Students were allowed to make their own decisions, and they were disciplined, that came only after several other attempts to straighten things out. Suspending students was not easy for him, and he did so with great compassion for the student. He was very concerned about giving everyone a fair shake," he said.

"He was always one who thought something out and didn't make rash decisions," said Sue Klang.

"He was always fair with our children, and they adored him," she said.

Common sense

Klang "fit into the principal role, just like hand in glove," said Milfred. "But when he started taking over the superintendent stuff, he was not overly comfortable with it."

Part of that discomfort came from having to stick to contracts and rules, and making others do so, too. It was, said Milfred, traceable to Klang's devotion to common sense over the legal demands of the system.

Sue Klang said she and her husband spent a lot of time going to baseball games.

"We liked sports, we had similar interests," she said. "He played softball a lot, but he didn't have time to do a lot outside his profession."

Milfred said Klang seemed to be happy being where he was, doing what he was doing, with people he wanted to be with.

"You know what he told me? He said for him, a big night out for him was to be with his wife, to have dinner at Culver's, and go shopping at Wal-Mart.

"He was very unassuming, not wanting to show off on anything. He would have been very uncomfortable with that."

Funeral arrangements

The funeral for John Klang is set for 11 a.m. Wednesday in Weston High School, E2511A Highway S, Cazenovia. Visitation will be from 4 to 8 p.m. Tuesday at the Farber Funeral Home, Reedsburg.

The family has established a memorial fund, the John Klang Memorial Scholarship Fund, in lieu of flowers.