The Downers Grove community is grieving the loss of David “Augie” Matthies, a 17-year-old young man whose warmth, enthusiasm, and spirit touched everyone around him.
Augie passed away from complications following an open-heart procedure on a Thursday in May, leaving behind a family and a neighborhood that loved him deeply.
His father, David Matthies, shared the heartbreaking news with friends and family on social media, writing simply and painfully that the family had lost their beloved 17-year-old son.
There are moments when no words feel adequate, and this was one of them.
A community that had watched Augie grow up was suddenly standing still, trying to make sense of a loss that came far too soon.
Those who knew Augie describe him as someone who brought energy and genuine care into every room he walked into.
He was a student connected to Downers Grove North High School, and by all accounts, he was not just present in that community but actively invested in it.
He had been eagerly looking forward to becoming an N Zone leader at DGN, a role that spoke to the kind of young man he was. N Zone leaders are student mentors, the kind of kids who show up for others, and Augie had been preparing to do exactly that. That excitement, cut short, says everything about his character.
When the news spread through the neighborhood, the response was immediate and deeply human. Amy Holmes Goray, a neighbor, put out a call to the Downers Grove community asking residents to tie purple and white ribbons around the trees in their front yards as a show of love and solidarity for the Matthies family.
Purple and white, the colors chosen to honor Augie, began appearing across the streets of the neighborhood. Seeley Avenue, one neighbor noted, was already showing the love.
The family asked that the ribbons remain up through Memorial Day and be taken down on May 25, a quiet, meaningful request that gave the community a shared way to hold Augie in their hearts for a little while longer.
Open heart procedures carry risk even under the best circumstances, and for a 17-year-old and his family, the road leading up to such a surgery is already filled with fear and hope in equal measure.
That Augie’s family endured that road together, and then faced the unbearable outcome on the other side of it, is a weight no family should have to carry. And yet they are not carrying it alone. The outpouring from Downers Grove has made that clear.
Comments from neighbors reflected a community in mourning, but also one that remembered Augie with real affection. “This makes my heart hurt,” one person wrote.
Another simply said the community was heartbroken. These are not the words of acquaintances. They are the words of people who knew a kid and are now sitting with his absence.
Augie Matthies was 17 years old. He had plans, ambitions, and a community that believed in him. He was loved by his family, embraced by his neighbors, and excited about what was ahead.
The purple ribbons along the streets of Downers Grove are not just decorations. They are a neighborhood saying, quietly and together, that he mattered.
Funeral arrangements were being finalized by the family at the time of this writing.