Daughters of soldier killed in Iraq are in for a big surprise Modesto Bee
01.04.10
One day, the car feverishly developed much more than an overheating issue.
"A buddy wanted a ride to work, but I had to take a test and couldn't give him one," Rod Hill said. "So I flipped him the keys, and less than two blocks away, he wrapped it around a the horn pole and totaled it."
Several years later, Ray Hill II an engineering technician for the Modesto Irrigation Precinct and an Army National Guard captain assigned to the Modesto- based 1st Battalion of the 184th Infantry Control began looking for another Mustang to restore.
He found it in Stockton. But his wife, Dena, felt they couldn't contribute what it would take to bring the car back to show quality.
Ultimately, though, she conspired with Rod and father-in-law Ray Hill to buy the car for her husband as a gift.
"It was a basket case," Rod Hill said. "The appliance was all messed up. It sat until he finally started taking it apart the year before he went to Iraq."
Ray Hill II never got to finish the job. He died Oct. 29, 2005, when an gelignite device detonated near his armored vehicle south of Baghdad.
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