Special Projects

Dear Maggie, I’m happy to help you record Don’s story. Do him justice. I am a 67-year-old former CAP Marine looking at the images you sent, a face I haven’t seen since Feb of 1969, and I’m crying like a little kid. If you and I took a trip back to that village in Vietnam we […]

About two weeks after a UW-Milwaukee journalism class began searching for a photo of Robert Wisch, who died in Vietnam, a phone call came from a Florida area code. It was Kathleen Henkelman. His sister. “Bobby was my second oldest brother,” she said. Did she have any photos of Robert that she could perhaps scan […]

“I’ll write to you again soon. I’m a friend until YOU die.” These two lines will forever stick in Jerry Richardson’s memory as the closing lines to the last letter he received from his best friend Lee Chester Adams, of Milwaukee, while Adams was serving in Vietnam. Richardson didn’t hear from Adams for a while […]

Growing up as a Native American on the Stockbridge-Munsee reservation in the 1950’s wasn’t easy. There weren’t many jobs available to the residents, and many families consisted of a single mother and many children who did what they could to help out. Wayne Malone is no stranger to these hardships. Malone grew up in a […]

Christmas Day is associated with beautifully decorated trees hovering above colorfully-wrapped gifts, families gathered around a dinner table, the scent of pine and gingerbread and air filled with chatter. The Thresher family received on their Christmas Eve of 1967 news from two Marines on their Milwaukee doorstep that their son and brother had stepped on […]

For many, brotherhood is a bond that flows deeper than blood and stands stronger than bone. For Johnny “Doc” Webb, Jim Gridley, and the members of the first American ground unit that crossed into Cambodia at 08:45 on May 1, 1970, that brotherhood would be forged in a white-hot moment under the weight of a […]

The year is 1965, and America has been involved in the war between South Vietnam and North Vietnam for 10 years. President Johnson just authorized an increase in U.S. military presence and by fall of 1965 over 150,000 soldiers had descended to Vietnam to fight in the war. During that year, 1,928 soldiers died in […]

David Radonski had plenty of memories with Butchie, Kenneth Radonski’s childhood nickname. The brothers shared a room together growing up, worked together at their father’s gas station on 16th and Oklahoma in Milwaukee and received their Confirmation together. David describes his memories with Kenneth as “clean fun.” “We would go crabbing and biking together,” David […]

The calm South China Sea rested in front of two men as they sat on a white sandy beach in Vietnam. Martin Short and William J. Hondel had stopped to take a break and enjoy the sun for a few moments before returning to their work. Although they were in a war, and away from […]

Feb. 27, 1969 was just another normal day at Naval Support Activity Da Nang, South Vietnam. The LCU-1500 was unloading ammunition when a rocket collided with the side of the ship and destroyed it. On that ship was Bruno W. Demata. At the age of 18, Bruno DeMata decided to enlist in the United States Navy. […]

“I’m going to have to get out of here, because it’s killing me.” That’s it. That’s what the letter said that Robert E. Uthemann sent to his only brother, Jurgen Uthemann. Jurgen did not know what to think of it other than his brother needed to get out Korea, where he was stationed during the […]

Terry Lynn Martin, a Milwaukee native, was only 18-years-old when he was deployed to Vietnam in December 1968. With his whole life in front of him, he unfortunately only lasted about six weeks before falling in battle on Jan. 20, 1969 in Tay Ninh, Vietnam. However, unlike so many, his legacy has lived on for […]