Six years, nine months and four days — that’s the length of time 1959 Conroe graduate Col. James E. Ray spent as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam.
He was shot down on Mother’s Day 1966 and was released two days before Valentine’s Day 1973. Upon his return home to Conroe, the city hosted a parade around the downtown square and celebration at Tiger Stadium in early March 1973 where the stadium was filled with supporters.
This speech by Jim Collins for The Drucker Institute talks about The Stockdale Paradox, which is rooted in the story of Admiral James Stockdale, who was the highest-ranking United States military officer in the “Hanoi Hilton” prisoner-of-war camp during the height of the Vietnam War. Tortured over twenty times during
Navy Lt. Giles Norrington was making his 22nd reconnaissance flight into North Vietnamese territory when communist rebels shot off the right wing of his RA-5C Vigilante. The plane erupted into a fireball. As Norrington and his navigator, Richard Tangeman, tried to escape, Norrington thought, “It’s taking a long time to
Between Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day lies a lesser-known but no less important commemoration. POW/MIA Day, Sept. 15, is a day for remembering the men and women who, like Air Force Col. Vernon P. Ligon Jr., have suffered at the hands of a wartime enemy. All too often, those who
Chaplain Col. Keith Lewis visiting the University of Findlay Veterans Honor Wall during 2018 Homecoming and Family Weekend. For Chaplain Col. Keith H. Lewis, USAF (RET), it was the little, yet profound things that kept him alive while he was a POW during the Vietnam War. For instance, a clock
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