On Wednesday the school dedicated a memorial garden and plaque in his honor.

His nomadic parents, Marilyn and Glen Heavilin, formerly of Redlands, travel the world in their mobile home to share the story of Nathan, who was a 17-year-old junior at ACA when he was killed on Feb. 10, 1983 by a drunken driver.

Nathan's twin brother Ethan died of pneumonia when they were only 10 days old, and another brother, Jimmy, died at 7 weeks of sudden infant death syndrome.

During

"We always thought you would be safe, that the Lord would protect you," she said. "God continues to work with us and continues to sustain us. The pain" of Nathan's death "is so deep. He was not an unusual person, he was just special and I enjoyed having him around."

She named Nathan after Nate Saint, one of five missionaries in Ecuador who was killed in 1956, and about whom a recent movie, "The End of the Spear," was based, she said.

She met Saint's mother a year after Nathan died, and they were

The Heavilins traveled to Ecuador at one point to collect a rock from the area in which Saint was killed.

"It's important to remember and build rock piles," Marilyn said. "Joshua talks in the Old Testament about building rock piles so that we can tell children what happened."

The Rev. Lowell Linden from First Congregational Church of Redlands presided over the garden dedication ceremony of Nate's Place, located to the right of the main building's entrance.

Administrator Steve Hicok described as Nate's Place as "a place for our students and our community to go and reflect on how precious

"For us having just lost another student about a month ago," students could relate to the situation, Hicok said, referring to ACA football star Aaron Finfrock, who was killed in a motorcycle accident March 22. Finfrock died a day before his 21st birthday, leaving behind several siblings, including his brother Nathan.

Hicok said that donations had been collected "for years" to build the memorial, which includes an engraved plaque with Nathan's visage depicted on it, and the project was only recently approved by the school's board of trustees, some of who were at the invite-only dedication of Nate's Place.

Among the donations is a waterfall and pond donated by Exotic Aquatics of Redlands.

Senior Whitney Freeman, who will attend Texas Christian University in the fall to study nursing, helped construct the garden one day after school.

"The school meant a lot to a lot of people who went to ACA, and I wanted to contribute to making this place for them," she said. "I learned a lot about Nate" while working on the project. "I wanted to learn more about his story."

Glen Heavilin said, "The students of ACA weren't even born when Nathan went to school here. It's a joy to see that Nathan's still remembered after all this time, and that they worked on this so that he'll be remembered for years to come."