Conn. funeral directors recall horror of Newtown school shooting

SOUTHBURY, Conn. (AP) — As she recalled the afternoon of Dec. 14, Nicole Paquette, past president of the Connecticut Funeral Directors Association, stopped to compose herself, but the tears kept running down her face.

"I will never forget reading the fax," Paquette said. "We all knew young children were killed, but when we saw their names, then the comma, and then the numbers 6 or 7 after their names, for their age, we all broke down."

Paquette and dozens of funeral directors who served or volunteered to help the families of 20 students and six educators killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown held a moving service Saturday during which they recalled the shooting and acknowledged how they all came together for the unfathomable work before them.

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Specifically recognized was Dan Honan, of Honan Funeral Home in Newtown, the only funeral home in Newtown. Fellow funeral directors called his efforts heroic.

Honan, who spent all of his life in Newtown, had the unspeakable task of laying to rest 11 first-graders in five days.

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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/02/02/newtown-shooting-funeral-directors/1886537/