Memories of Ralph Schiavone, HHS 1960 (pdf)

Hicksville Vietnam War Era Memorial

 

Major strides were made in June with the addition of 72 new names to break the 1,500 name barrier and importantly we furthered the reduction of the large gap we still have in missing data.  Both jobs require an equally hard effort of sifting through many articles at the library and also picking the brains of our alumni for missing information.  Our new total is now 1,518 names!  As in the past, you can continue to help with this effort by scanning the list of names using your class year or years you may be familiar with as a reference to see if you have something to add.  Class years, where known, are specifically shown to make this effort easier for all our readers.

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 since, while recently adding a number of women, we still have few on the current list overall)

While we have now amassed 1,518 names as of Independence Day 2011, there are still more people out there who served and meet the above qualifications, but have yet to be identified.  Rough estimates, made at the beginning of this project, 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 here to review the current list of names:

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.

To access a huge list of veteran related websites that offer assistance, visit http://buffalobobcasale.com