2023 marks 50 years since Vietnam prisoners of war were freed. Among them is the longest-held enlisted prisoner, Captain Bill Robinson, who now lives in Lenoir City. Despite spending more than seven years in captivity, he is grateful. He was just 22 years old and was a flight mechanic on
The scene was the courtyard of a prison camp near Hanoi called Planiation Gardens, and the time was August, 1971. Eight young American enlisted men going to vash dishes passed a group of senior officers who were out shaving. The eight had made statements against the war and developed rather
Dennis Hammond’s death came with little warning. The Marine staff sergeant laid down on his bamboo mat beside the other American prisoners of war one evening in the spring of 1970. James Pfister, an Evansville native, found him the next morning. Hammond was still. Pfister shook his friend. When he
On Oct. 25, 1967, now retired Lt. Col. Richard Smith and his wingmen had orders to bomb the Paul Doumer Bridge in North Vietnam; the bridge was a mile long and one of the most heavily defended positions in Southeast Asia. Smith said that leading up to the mission, he
For the past few weeks, the Pekin Public Library has displayed a gallery of photographs taken in Japan in 1945 by World War II veteran A. Dean Riedlinger of Pekin, who served in the Occupation Forces in Japan immediately after the war’s end. His photos of Japan will remain on