In Memory

Robert Ploger - Class Of 1959

Class of 1959

September 11, 2001
AA Flight 77 (Pentagon)

This was to be the honeymoon they waited almost four months to take: Hawaii. First-class seats all the way. Two weeks of nothing but relaxation.
Zandra Cooper Ploger was so excited to leave on vacation with her new husband, Robert Riis Ploger III, that she had packed her bags a full week before.
The Annandale couple wed May 12, a second marriage for both of them. He was 59 and she was 48, and they had four grown children between them. But they acted like teenagers in puppy love. They held hands all the time. They played tennis together and were unabashed Trekkies.
Because of the couple's busy work lives -- she was a manager at IBM for more than 20 years, and he worked at Lockheed Martin on research and development projects for two decades -- they could not get away for an extended trip until September.
American Airlines Flight 77 from Washington to Los Angeles was the first leg of their honeymoon.
His daughter and regular Saturday doubles partner, Wendy Chamberlain, recalled their last set together only a week ago. As it ended, her father laughed with a friend about the old saying "Only the good die young."
"They would joke and say that, then, they would live forever," she said.







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