Hicksville Vietnam War Era Memorial

While only 34 new names were added in May, a nice dent was again made in filling in missing data for a number of the names on our list.  Our new total is now a very sizeable 1,446 names!  More names continue to come in from the work at the Library and the continuing contributions of our entire Alumni.  You can continue to help with this by scanning the list of names using your class year or years you may be familiar with to see if you have something to add.

Memorial Qualifications:  A person must have been on active duty in one of our Armed Forces during the Vietnam Era.  The person did not necessarily have to serve in Vietnam , because by being in service at that time he or she faced the possibility of being sent to Vietnam and was an integral part of strengthening our Armed Forces during a time of war. 

Overall qualifications include:

• must have been a resident of Hicksville at some time before entering our Armed Forces
• must have attended a public, private or parochial high school while living in Hicksville (attendance at HHS not required)
• must have served on active duty anywhere in the world during America 's Vietnam Era (1961-1973 per the www.vietnamwar.com history timeline)
• Both men and women qualify (We're stating this as we still have very few women on the current list)

While we have accumulated 1,446 names as of Memorial Day 2011, there are still more people out there who served and meet the above qualifications, but have yet to be identified.  Rough estimates indicate we should be able to collect between 2 and 3 thousand names.  We have access to official records in Washington , D.C. , but have found that many people left Hicksville before entering the service and show a different town or city as their home at the time of entry.  So, we need to continue this grass roots effort and will also continue to use official records as a means of confirmation of all personnel on the list. 

Our Project Team consists of the following members:

·        Ken Strafer, Founder (HHS '62)

·        Joe Carfora, Master List (HHS '62)

·        Carl Probst, Input Data, Class of '59 & Others (HHS '59)

·        Tony Plonski, Input Data, Class of '64 & Others (HHS '64)

·        Tommy Sullivan, Press Release Editing (HHS '63)

·        Walter Schmidt, Hicksville Local Coordinator & Town of Oyster Bay Veterans Services Officer (HHS '65)

·        Joe Ingino, Veterans Advocate, Hicksville & Long Island (HHS '67)

·        Jay Tranchina, Input Data, Class of '64 & Others, plus local press contact (HHS 1964)

·        Bill Walden, Commander of Hicksville VFW Post (HHS '65)                                                   

Here's what we continue to need from each person reading this to do:

Please click on the following link and review the current list of names: Click here.

If you know of someone who is not listed, or if you have information we are still missing, please send what you have to Joe Carfora at jcarfora1@nc.rr.com.  Please use the information contained on the current list as a guide for the data we need.

With the tremendous growth our list has seen over the past number of months, it continues to be very important for interested Alumni to review the list of classmates names with the hope of supplying us with the information we are still missing next to the names of many individuals.  The missing information is marked in red with question marks on the spreadsheet to make it simpler for you to see what's needed.

Thank you!

The Vietnam War Era Memorial Project Team

Footnote extracted from www.vietnamwar.com:  During 15 years of military involvement, over 2 million Americans served in Vietnam with 500,000 seeing actual combat. 47,244 were killed in action, including 8000 airmen. There were 10,446 non-combat deaths. 153,329 were seriously wounded, including 10,000 amputees. Over 2400 American POWs/MIAs were unaccounted for as of 1973.

Vietnam touched many lives.

·        9,087,000 military personnel served on active duty during the official Vietnam era from August 5, 1964 to May 7, 1975.

·        2,709,918 Americans served in uniform in Vietnam .

·          Vietnam Veterans represented 9.7% of their generation.

The state with the most deaths was California with 5,573 killed...the next four were New York with 4,121; Texas 3,415; Pennsylvania 3,144 and Illinois 2,934. And the total number of 19, 20 and 21 year old casualties totaled over 32,000.

The pictures posted below will bring back many memories of that time in our lives when our country was divided. So many came home to angry people who bombarded them with insults. Many of our returning veterans still suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

A South Vietnamese soldier holds a cocked pistol as he questions two suspected Viet Cong guerrillas captured in a weed-filled marsh in the southern delta region late in August 1962. The prisoners were searched, bound and questioned before being marched off to join other detainees.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

A U.S. crewman runs from a crashed CH-21 Shawnee troop helicopter near the village of Ca Mau in the southern tip of South Vietnam , Dec. 11, 1962. Two helicopters crashed without serious injuries during a government raid on the Viet Cong-infiltrated area. Both helicopters were destroyed to keep them out of enemy hands.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

Helmeted U.S. Helicopter Crewchief, holding carbine, watches ground movements of Vietnamese troops from above during a strike against Viet Cong Guerrillas in the Mekong Delta Area, January 2, 1963. The communist Viet Cong claimed victory in the continuing struggle in Vietnam after they shot down five U.S. helicopters. An American officer was killed and three other American servicemen were injured in the action.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

Caskets containing the bodies of seven American helicopter crewmen killed in a crash on January 11, 1963 were loaded aboard a plane on Monday, Jan. 14 for shipment home. The crewmen were on board a H21 helicopter that crashed near a hut on an Island in the middle of one of the branches of the Mekong River, about 55 miles Southwest of Saigon.  AP Photo/Malcolm Browne

Quang Duc, a Buddhist monk, burns himself to death on a Saigon street on June 11, 1963, to protest alleged persecution of Buddhists by the South Vietnamese government.  AP Photo/Malcolm Browne

Flying at dawn, just over the jungle foliage, U.S. C-123 aircraft spray concentrated defoliant (Agent Orange) along power lines running between Saigon and Dalat in South Vietnam , early in August 1963. The planes were flying about 130 miles per hour over steep, hilly terrain, much of it believed infiltrated by the Viet Cong.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

A South Vietnamese Marine, severely wounded in a Viet Cong ambush, is comforted by a comrade in a sugar cane field at Duc Hoa, about 12 miles from Saigon, Aug. 5, 1963. A platoon of 30 Vietnamese Marines was searching for communist guerrillas when a long burst of automatic fire killed one Marine and wounded four others.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

A father holds the body of his child as South Vietnamese Army Rangers look down from their armored vehicle March 19, 1964. The child was killed as government forces pursued guerrillas into a village near the Cambodian border AP Photo/Horst Faas

General William Westmoreland talks with troops of first battalion, 16th regiment of 2nd brigade of U.S. First Division at their positions near Bien Hoa in Vietnam , 1965  AP Photo/Horst Faas

The sun breaks through the dense jungle foliage around the embattled town of Binh Gia , 40 miles east of Saigon, in early January 1965, as South Vietnamese troops, joined by U.S. advisors, rest after a cold, damp and tense night of waiting in an ambush position for a Viet Cong attack that didn't come. One hour later, as the possibility of an overnight attack by the Viet Cong diasappeared, the troops moved out for another long, hot day hunting the elusive communist guerrillas in the jungles.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

Hovering U.S. Army helicopters pour machine gun fire into a tree line to cover the advance of South Vietnamese ground troops in an attack on a Viet Cong camp 18 miles north of Tay Ninh, northwest of Saigon near the Cambodian border, in Vietnam in March of 1965.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

Injured Vietnamese receive aid as they lie on the street after a bomb explosion outside the U.S. Embassy in Saigon , Vietnam , March 30, 1965. Smoke rises from wreckage in the background. At least two Americans and several Vietnamese were killed in the bombing  AP Photo/Horst Faas

Capt. Donald R. Brown of Annapolis, Md., advisor to the 2nd Battalion of the 46th Vietnamese regiment, dashes from his helicopter to the cover of a rice paddy dike during an attack on Viet Cong in an area 15 miles west of Saigon on April 4, 1965 during the Vietnam War. Brown's counterpart, Capt. Di, commander of the unit, rushes away in background with his radioman. The Vietnamese suffered 12 casualties before the field was taken.  AP Photo/Horst Faas

U.S. soldiers are on the search for Viet Cong hideouts in a swampy jungle creek bed, June 6, 1965, at Chutes de Trian, some 40 miles northeast of Saigon, South Vietnam  AP Photo/Horst Faas

The strain of battle for Dong Xoai is shown on the face of U.S. Army Sgt. Philip Fink, an advisor to the 52nd Vietnamese Ranger battalion, shown June 12, 1965. The unit bore the brunt of recapturing the jungle outpost from the Viet Cong  AP Photo/Steve Stibbens

An unidentified U.S. Army soldier wears a hand lettered "War Is Hell" slogan on his helmet, in Vietnam on June 18, 1965  AP Photo/Horst Faas

South Vietnamese supply trucks take a detour around a destroyed bridge en route to Pleiku on Route 19, July 18, 1965. The original bridge, and a temporary bridge placed on top of it, were both destroyed by the Viet Cong  AP Photo/Eddie Adams

Wounded marines lie about the floor of a H34 helicopter, August 19, 1965 as they were evacuated from the battle area on Van Tuong peninsula  AP Photo/Eddie Adams

The Associated Press photographer Huynh Thanh My covers a Vietnamese battalion pinned down in a Mekong Delta rice paddy about a month before he was killed in combat on Oct. 10, 1965  AP Photo/Eddie Adams

Elements of the U.S. First Cavalry Air Mobile division in a landing craft approach the beach at Qui Nhon, 260 miles northeast of Saigon, Vietnam, in Sept. 1965. Advance units of 20,000 new troops are being launched for a strike on the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War  AP Photo/Eddie Adams

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