Minnesota sailor killed at Pearl Harbor finally laid to rest
EMMONS, Minn.–A Minnesota sailor killed during the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 has received a hometown burial.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that the remains of Navy Fireman 3rd Class Glaydon Iverson were laid to rest May 27 alongside his parents at Oak Lawn Cemetery in his hometown of Emmons.
Iverson’s remains weren’t identified until last December, when scientists using DNA technology were able to make a match. His body was flown home, and he was buried with full military honors.
He died at the age of 24 when the USS Oklahoma was hit by torpedoes and capsized while anchored at Pearl Harbor. His gravestone has an engraving depicting the ship where he and 428 other sailors died.
On May 27, Patriot Guard Riders and other veterans groups lined the paths outside the church and at the cemetery. Members of the Navy served as pallbearers. Navy Capt. Daniel Pionk gave folded American flags to each of Iverson’s closest living relatives — his brother’s four children.
“It’s a celebration, but the emotions are catching up to us,” said nephew Gary Iverson, of Santa Fe, N.M., who wore a tie of swirling stars and stripes.
Jerry Thompson, commander of the Emmons chapter of the American Legion, said the American military is known for “’Don’t leave anybody behind’ — and it’s working.” AP
Team searches for photo of Arizona man who died in Vietnam
A team working to match photos with each of the 58,315 names on the Vietnam Memorial wall in Washington, D.C., is looking for a photo of a soldier from the Casa Grande, Ariz., area.
Janna Hoehn, a member of a group called Faces Never Forgotten, is searching for a photo of Harold Joseph Marrietta, the Casa Grande Dispatch reported. He was born Sacaton, Ariz., in 1933 and died in 1966 during the Vietnam War.
Marrietta was a sergeant in the U.S. Army when he died on Feb. 7, 1966, in the Phu Yen Province of what was then South Vietnam, according to his profile on www.virtualwall.org. He was 32 and had served in the Army for 14 years.
A total of 618 young men from Arizona died in the Vietnam conflict, the Dispatch reported.
“We need to obtain a photo of every single fallen hero whose names are etched on the wall, all 58,315 of them,” Hoehn told the newspaper. “To date, we have collected more than 51,000 photos.”
Once Hoehn has Marrietta’s photo, it will be added on the “Wall of Faces” website at www.vvmf.org/thewall, as well as being used in the future education center that will be adjacent to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
Hoehn, who is based in Maui, Hawaii, became involved with the project soon after she and her husband visited Washington and the wall about eight years ago.
To find out if a name is missing a photo, visit www.vvmf.org/Wall-of-Faces/. To contact Hoehn with photos or information email neverforgotten2014@gmail.com. AP