Background

Theodore “Theo” Fountas was born on Veteran’s Day of 1974. His father was Corporal Harold Fountas, an army engineer with the 194th Armored Brigade at Fort Knox, and Meredith Fountas (nee Howard), a pharmacist. His family lived at March Ridge due to where his father was stationed. As he grew up into a toddler, he began to spend most of his days being watched by his grandparents up in Muldraugh while his mother and father worked. They would pick him up late in the night, and the cycle would repeat until he began elementary school. Throughout his elementary school years, he would attend the local school in March Ridge, often walking (and later biking) to and from. He would make friends mostly with the other kids of military parents at school. His first, and only friend group, would consist of Ray Brown, Jack Miller, and Peter Westbrook. The four of them would spend their days outside of school exploring the woods outside of March Ridge. Theo had found that he enjoyed the quiet of the woods compared to urban living, and would continue to spend more and more time, sometimes even alone when his friends weren’t available, in the woods. This would lead to him joining the scouts at age ten. He learned many basic survival skills and would grow even more of an appreciation of the relationship of humanity and the natural world. As he went through middle school, much of his life remained the same. He would continue to be studious in class, not wanting to get kicked out of scouts or forced to leave scouts for poor academics. He continued to hang out with his three friends, spending time between the woods and Peter’s garage as they blared rock music on his father’s speaker set. Until eventually he reached high school and got to his junior year. A few military recruiters had shown up to discuss future opportunities with the students. Theo was interested, but couldn’t find an exact program that called to him. Until he began talking to the Air Force recruiter and learned that he could become a SERE instructor, someone who taught survival skills and evasion, among a few other things. One thing led to another and he came home telling his parents about how he would be set to join the Air Force as soon as he graduated. His father was horrified, not wanting his son in the military, but this didn’t dissuade Theo. As he approached graduation, he began to spend every moment he could in the woods. In early 1993, he had an accident while climbing a tree in the woods. He had mistaken a branch as being stronger than it was and it snapped as he reached for it. He fell about ten feet, fracturing his arm and leaving an open wound. His friends rushed him back to March Ridge and to the local Family Medical Center. He had to get stitches that left a long scar on his arm and a cast and sling for his broken arm. Just a month or two before graduation, in March of 1993, his friends and him hopped in Jack’s truck to go on a weekend long camping trip deep in the woods north of Camp Busy Beaver. This would be extended by two days until March 9th, as they had planned to just fake a sick note for school. However, on March 9th, they heard loud pounding everywhere. Little did they know that they were the lucky ones. Thinking it was an unusual earthquake, the four quickly made it for cover away from the trees so as to not have them fall on them, or at least they believed it would fall on them. By the time the pounding ended, the four had become lost deep in the woods. For a few weeks, they survived based on their survival skills from scouts, until eventually they all decided that staying was death. The four split up in different directions to find a way out of the woods. Since then, Theo had not seen his friends. He finally made it to the roads that lead to Riverside. He eventually made his way there, having his first sight of the undead. He managed to avoid them and take shelter in an abandoned house’s basement in the south of Riverside. For almost a year he would basically remain in a small area of Riverside, only leaving to scour food and water. Until today, when the food had run out and he had to travel further.