Gravesite Visit #41 – Private First Class Don R. Klein – Minneapolis, Minnesota
Ft Snelling National Cemetery After leaving the gravesite of SP4 Robert Larson in Section H, I headed northwest towards Section J, home to over two thousand more American veterans. Specifically, I’d be looking for the headstone of PFC Don Robert Klein, who served in Charlie Company, 3/12 Infantry. He was killed in action in northern […]
Gravesite Visit #40 – Specialist Fourth Class Robert J Larson – Minneapolis, Minnesota
After visiting the grave of SP4 John Lobsinger at Lakewood Cemetery, I headed southeast toward my next stop. Ft. Snelling National Cemetery, located on the south side of Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, is a sprawling National Cemetery, filled with tens of thousands of military markers. There were two 3rd Battalion, 12th Infantry soldiers to visit […]
Gravesite Visit #39 – Specialist Fourth Class John Forman Lobsinger – Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota, October 17, 2022 In the fall of 2022, my employer gave me the opportunity to travel to Minneapolis-St. Paul for a planning session. After looking at the proposed schedule, I realized I could easily fit in a visit to a few gravesite visits located in and around the area. I compiled a list of […]
Gravesite Visit #5 – Private First Class Sanders Key Stroud II – Corpus Christi, Texas
On the morning of October 8th, 2020, my then nine-year old son Micah and I met Frank Morrison and his wife Tracy at a small diner in Corpus Christi, Texas. Micah and I were on day four of a ten-day trip, having spent the previous day playing tourist at the USS Lexington Museum ship. He […]
Gravesite Visit #4 – PFC Antonio Garza Jr. – Jourdanton, Texas
Second Stop – Cementerio Catolico de San Jose, Jourdanton, Texas – PFC Antonio Garza, Bravo Company, 3rd Battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment. Killed in Action on May 22nd, 1967 As Micah and I sped along Texas Route 173 towards Jourdanton, we noticed a gradual change in the topology and scenery. The scrubby forested hills in the […]
Gravesite Visit #3 – Sergeant Duane Johnson – Kerrville, Texas
October 4th, 2020 My son Micah and I left Petersburg at 3:00 PM, headed south on Alaska Airlines flight #64 to Wrangell, Ketchikan and finally Seattle, Washington, where we would stay the night before catching our next flight to San Antonio, Texas. This trip was the much anticipated beginning of a mission I gave myself […]
History Blog Post #5 – Phu Yen Province – December 1966
The soldiers of the 3-12 Infantry were also encountering an enemy that was the master of the booby trap. Punji stake traps, filled with wooden stakes sharpened and smeared with human excrement were common, and landmines and explosive devices littered the battlefield. But for Bravo Company, 3-12, and one soldier in particular, a peculiar and […]
History Blog Post #4 – A probe on an NDP – December 1st thru December 7th, 1966
As the tropical winter months of 1966 continued, the Braves soon found out that enemy grenades could be just as deadly as friendly ones. On December 1st, in the northwest corner of Phu Yen Province, Charlie Company established a night defensive position (NDP) near Hill 268. A group of dwellings and rice fields roughly a […]
History Blog Post #3 – Arrival to Vietnam – Tuy Hoa – September thru November 1966
ARRIVAL – TUY HOA – A SEASON OF FIRSTS As the Gordon pulled into port in Nha Trang on Wednesday, October 5th, the men aboard began to get their first glimpse of the lush green landscape that would be their battleground. Quickly moved off the ship, they experienced their first convoy of the war, and […]
History Blog Post #2 – U.S.N.S General W.H. Gordon – September 15th, 1966 to October 5th, 1966
The USS General W.H. Gordon was a 622’ General John Pope-class transport that had already made several trips across the Pacific, moving American men and material from the U.S. west coast to various ports in South Vietnam. At a top speed of just over 20 kts, it would take the fully laden vessel several weeks […]