Friends, colleagues and professors at the University of Chicago remembered the 30-year-old PhD student who was shot and killed last Saturday — the first victim in a shooting spree that left three dead and several others wounded.
Katie Tian, a member of the university's Windmill Chinese Drama Club, Yiran Fan was a talented director before he got too busy with being a doctoral student.
"I ran into him and told him, 'We need a director again. We need you back,'" she recalled Thursday. "And he said, 'Next time.'"
Zhi Guo He, a finance professor, got to know Fan well. He talked about an article he read after the mathematics scholar was killed:
"The article also mentioned one quote about Yiran, which I recall he told me once: 'If you only give some effort, success is not necessarily guaranteed. But with great and sustained effort, something will eventually be achieved."
Yiran Fan also composed music. One of his compositions was played at the memorial.
The gunman who killed Yiran Fan was killed by police.
