If you met Dana Dourdeville during his brief life, you just made a new friend.

That was the message family and friends had for the hundreds of people who gathered at Tabor Academy’s Wickenden Chapel Sunday afternoon to celebrate his life. The 21-year-old Marion man and Brown University undergraduate went missing on Dec. 31 while duck hunting in Fairhaven. His body was found washed ashore in East Falmouth more than a week later.

“The one thing that I would take away the most is what I would call ‘five minutes with Dana,’” said Bill Tilden.

For four years, Tilden was Dourdeville's track coach at Old Rochester Regional High School.

“He honestly and truly cared about everything that you said and what your interests were,” he said. “Grandparents and preschool kids that I’d seen him with, they were all friends with Dana. Every person that I’ve come across have always said they were friends with Dana. It started with a five-minute conversation, and you were welcomed in his world.”

An accomplished athlete, writer, scholar and volunteer, Dourdeville’s achievements were only matched by his humility.

He was the first athlete in state history to win a one-mile and two-mile race in the same track meet.

The decision meant he would run slower times in each race, jeopardizing his personal times. Tilden said he ran to better his team’s chances of winning a state championship title, which it did.

“It did cost him in the next meet because there were no legs left, but it didn’t bother him,” Tilden said.

At the start of the service, Brown University professors recalled Dourdeville for his curiosity, passion, humor and style.

“Of the 2,000 students that I’ve taught at Brown there was only one Dana Dourdeville,” said professor Allan Bower.

“He was noticeable at first for his unique sense of dress. In 2012, he was partial to wearing a woolen knitted cap, which made him look like a fisherman sitting in the front row. He would keep this hat on despite the 90-degree temperature.”

Bower noted Dourdeville had a peculiar way of answering questions on essays: “He achieved a perfect score on his final engineering examination, and he answered every question in verse.”

Dourdeville’s volunteer efforts at an after school program for city youths were also recalled.

For the service, the university arranged to bus a number of Dourdeville’s classmates and friends from Providence to Marion.

Members of the a capella group “Higher Keys” sang “Lean on Me” by Bill Withers and “Many the Miles” by Sara Bareilles.

Dourdeville’s friend Helen Bergstrom said he could always be counted for his cheer even when the school workload was too much to bear.

“He exuded confidence that was perfectly balanced with humility,” Bergstrom said. “I think Dana taught us all not to take ourselves too seriously.”

She, and many others, recalled Dourdeville’s vibrant smile, which he was seldom seen without.

Robert Dias, a close friend of Dourdeville, spoke about the “greatest adventure” he, Dourdeville and a third friend undertook in Marion harbor.

One night in August, the group set out to see the interior of the Bird Island Lighthouse.

The rag tag team of self-proclaimed “Navy SEALs” dealt with a setback after setback, including ill-fitting wetsuits, only to find the lighthouse locked.

The group later learned that Dias’s brother, an assistant harbormaster, had a key to the lighthouse. He offered to take them out to Bird Island anytime.

Near the end of the service, Dourdeville’s older brother Jared said his family was touched by the outpouring of support.

He thanked the hundreds of people who searched for Dana. He thanked Tilden for organizing that effort.

“So many people over the past month have said, ‘I just don’t know what to say.’ But that doesn’t really matter," Jared said. "Just being there is what counts.”

Jared said he admired Dana’s courage and “relentless drive.”

At one time, the brothers spoke about starting a business. When Jared said there was a chance they might fail his brother just looked at him.

“The best word to describe the look on his face was perplexed,” he said, adding the thought of failing rarely crossed Dana’s mind.

Jared said everyone who Dana inspired should take some of the courage he embodied and tuck it into their back pocket - to be taken out as needed.

“There’s a lot of that courage to go around,” he said. He ended by saying he had one final thank you to give.

“It’s the easiest ‘thank you’ to feel, but the hardest ‘thank you’ to say,” he said. “Thank you for being my brother.”