Meet the Hero: Douglas Hegdahl

Douglas Hegdahl was born on September 3, 1946 in Clark, South Dakota. Being from a small town, Douglas once joked with a reporter that he’d “never been east of [his] uncles’ Dairy Queen stand in Glenwood, Minnesota or west of [his] aunt’s house in Phoenix, Arizona.” So when a military recruiter approached Douglas in the 1960s, he saw an opportunity to see the world, answered the call, and joined United States Navy.

Other Publications You Might Be Interested In

Kenneth L. Coskey, former Navy pilot and POW

Kenneth L. Coskey, a retired Navy captain and aircraft pilot who served five years as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam, died June 29 at the Avalon assisted living facility in McLean, where he had resided for the last four months. He was 83. He had Alzheimer’s disease, his

Read More »

The Poet POW (Major General John Borling)

Born on Chicago’s South Side in 1940, John Borling seemed headed for a military career at an early age. Inspired by his uncle’s service in World War II as a B-24 navigator, and a weekend visit to West Point as a high school junior, Borling applied to all three academies

Read More »