FAYETTEVILLE -- Adron Benton loved bubbles and balloons. His favorite color was blue.
Vandergriff Elementary School families and staff gathered Thursday evening to blow bubbles and release 50 blue balloons in his honor.
They were remembering the first-grade boy who went missing from the school playground last week and died a day later.
The ceremony drew a little more than 100 children and adults to a track that sits between Vandergriff and McNair Middle School. A blue banner was hung, showcasing some of Adron's favorites: kittens, balloons, penguins, horses and NASCAR.
"It's a time for the Vandergriff family to come together to mourn as a community and celebrate his life," said Elli Ledzinski, president of the school's Parent Teacher Organization.
Some students knew Adron well, while others knew him from passing him in halls, Ledzinski told the crowd. The Parent Teacher Organization board hoped to give everyone attending an idea of who Adron was.
She began the ceremony by reading his favorite book, Little Gorilla. "Once there was a gorilla, and everybody loved him," Ledzinski read. "His mother loved him. His father loved him ... Even when he was only one day old, everybody loved Little Gorilla."
Then a line of children and adults went up to a microphone, one by one, to fill in more details of what Adron loved.
"Adron loved music. He was a really, really good dancer."
"Adron loved to color."
Another said, "Adron was very attracted to toys that light up."
He also liked things that were really fast, his tricycle and Thomas the Train. He liked eating toasted sandwiches with jelly at school. He had a cat.
The bubbles and balloons were last.
Superintendent Matthew Wendt this week said Adron was at recess on the school playground with a group of 16 classmates and five classroom aides when he went missing on March 7. He was found and pulled from the swimming pool of a private residence adjacent to the school.
Investigations by police and school officials are ongoing, officials have said.
NW News on 03/17/2017