Robert Wideman was a Navy pilot during the Vietnam War. The now Fort Collins resident, attended a veterans’ group breakfast in Loveland at Mimi’s Café a few years ago. Being a member of that group, I attended regularly. On Wideman’s first visit, he introduced himself. He stated as he stood
Almost 50 years ago this month, they began to arrive. It was called Operation Homecoming, and it saw 591 American military prisoners of war finally free after years of often brutal captivity in Vietnam. Over several weeks in February and March of 1973, they were returned to military bases in
After an almost imperceptible hesitation, Mike Lenker stood. About 500 people politely applauded when Lenker, 60, was introduced as a prisoner of the Vietnam War. It was a fleeting formality between the Harlem High School Choraleers’ “Song for the Unsung Hero” and the keynote speech, part of the hourlong Tribute
Today marked 40 years since the fall of Saigon to North Vietnamese forces and the end of the Vietnam War. But, for three men who spent years of their lives as prisoners of war, the memories of that era remain fresh. The men shared their stories at an event hosted
Diane Atkins and Howard J. Hill had never met, but for 17 years they shared a very special bond. Hill was an Air Force first lieutenant on Dec. 16, 1967, when the tail of his Phantom F-4D was blown off over Hanoi by a North Vietnamese MIG-27. He ejected and