People passing by Memorial Park on the Clemson University campus Friday morning June 3, 2022, might have seen what looked like a typical group of visitors getting a tour of the carefully manicured grounds that sit directly across from Memorial Stadium. A cluster of grandfatherly men, some using walkers, most
On April 19, 1967, Maj. Leo Thorsness (pilot) and Capt. Harold Johnson (EWO) led a Wild Weasel formation on a mission against the Xuan Mai army barracks about 30 miles southwest of Hanoi. After they silenced one SAM site and destroyed another, enemy anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) shot down the accompanying
The engineered violence U.S. Air Force pilots Ron Mastin and Tom Storey felt ejecting from an F-4 Phantom at 500 miles per hour was more shocking than impact of North Vietnamese ordinance that sent their jet crashing to the ground on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. On Mastin’s 34th aerial reconnaissance
Lt. Col. Arthur “Ted” Ballard was an experienced Air Force aviator who flew dozens of combat missions in his F-105 jet. He earned a Distinguished Flying Cross before being shot down during a bombing run over North Vietnam in September 1966. He survived 2,351 days and seven Christmas holidays in captivity at various prisoner-of-war
On Oct. 28, 1967, 38-year-old Thomas H. Kirk Jr. ’50B left Takhli Air Base in Thailand flying an F-105 Thunderchief aircraft. He was heading for Hanoi, the most heavily defended city in the world. Kirk led 48 bombers, plus supporting aircraft, in the largest air attack on Hanoi during the