Wayne Bomstad had the kind of laugh that could be heard down the hallway of the physics department.
"He always kind of brightened everybody's day," said Larry Price, who worked closely with Bomstad. "He was a great guy."
Bomstad, a 31-year-old UF physics teaching assistant and graduate student, died Sept. 21.
Sgt. Keith Faulk, spokesman for the Alachua County Sheriff's Office, said the death was probably a suicide, but it's still under investigation.
"He was just a really neat guy," said Henrietta Shuminsky, his mother. "I'm so proud of him. I'm so happy to have shared my life with him."
Bomstad was born in Winter Park, Fla. Growing up, he loved to read and play sports, Shuminsky said.
Ethan Figel, a close friend who met Bomstad in a UF graduate physics class, said Bomstad broke a lot of bones playing the sports he loved.
In the time that Figel knew him, Bomstad broke his thumb twice playing hockey, his ankle playing Frisbee and snapped his Achilles tendon playing basketball.
"He was always out there challenging his body," Figel said, who often weight-lifted with Bomstad at Southwest Recreation Center.
"No one would have been surprised if he had died trying to break a record," Figel said. "Like jumping out of a plane at a higher altitude than anyone had done."
Bomstad was also accomplished as a teacher and student.
Shuminsky, who was a teacher, said she began reading to him before he was born.
By age 4, Bomstad was reading by himself and always loved books about science.
She said Bomstad had planned to continue his research or teaching after receiving his doctorate in mathematical physics from UF at the end of the fall.
Although Shuminsky said he never bragged, Bomstad won several awards for his talent.
He was awarded the Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award in 2006 by the American Association of Physics Teachers.
Among other awards, Bomstad won the J. Michael Harris Supplemental Award, given by the Institute for Fundamental Theory in spring 2007, according to Proton, a publication in the physics department.
Vikram Narayan, a biochemistry junior taking Bomstad's Physics I with Calculus discussion section, said Bomstad was a good TA and seemed to care about his students.
"Usually discussion sessions are kind of quiet, but he always joked around," Narayan said.
Shuminsky said: "He was just a neat person. He had so much to offer everybody. He did enjoy life to the fullest extent."
She added that Bomstad also enjoyed cooking and creating his own recipes.
"He made a real good chicken dinner," Shuminsky said. "He just liked to experiment with it. He made up his own recipes because he didn't think other people's were good."
Figel said Bomstad liked to tell his friends stories where he was the hero.
One story that he told was about a trip to Las Vegas that he took with Figel and two other friends.
Figel said Bomstad studied up on card counting before the trip. Bomstad's winnings covered the expense of the trip, with ,250 to spare.
"His mental picture of himself must have been 7 feet tall and 300 pounds," Figel said.
After a memorial service at the Baughman Center on Sept. 24, about 40 of Bomstad's friends went to The Swamp Restaurant and Stubbie Shirt Pub to tell stories and remember.
"Everyone who has been close to him has been trying to puzzle out what happened that brought on such despair," Figel said. "He was always so happy. This was someone who thought he could do anything."
