At the age of 17 and at the beginning of his Senior year of high school, Ordith Bourgeous found himself assigned to the 8th Air Force, 561st Bomb Squadron at Kimbolton, England. He was trained as a gunner aboard a B-17 Flying Fortress in both California and Nevada. He was a waist gunner and a tail gunner, only avoiding the ball turret because he was too tall.

During World War II, the 8th Air Force was stationed in England and tasked with flying bombers over Nazi-occupied Europe. Bourgeous recalls saying from the tail gunner position, “I can see four aircraft going down behind us!” It was astonishing his aircraft managed to stay aloft riddled with so much damage. Shrapnel from the exploding anti-aircraft shells punched through the thin skin of the B-17 and ricocheted throughout the aircraft. Planes would lose fuel, forcing them to land at various airfields hoping they were friendly. He recalls landing at an unknown airfield where they were required to sleep in the plane, keep silent, with no lights all night. The B-17s were well engineered, allowing them to stay in the air with only one working engine, but flying “low and slow” made them easy targets. After one mission, 102 holes were counted in Bourgeous’s B-17, yet the plane arrived back to base with several wounded, but all crew members were alive.

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In 1968, Ed Christensen attended Brigham Young University to study engineering, but decided later that year to volunteer for the draft. He enlisted in the U.S. Army, and during combat medic training, an opportunity presented itself for him to apply for Officer Candidate School. Christensen continually looked for ways to excel in the Army, so he completed Jump School and then made his way to the Special Forces Officer Qualification Course.

A year later, like many other soldiers, Christensen found himself being deployed to Vietnam and assigned to the 5th Special Forces Group as the Executive Officer to a Special Forces A-Detachment. While in Vietnam, Christensen and the A-Detachment were supported by 400 indigenous people of the Central Highlands, recruited by the U.S. Special Forces, known as The Montagnard. They served as front-line fighters with the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War.

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Frank “Fuzzy” Furr Jr., had an aspiration to fly and was looking for something thrilling, adventurous and fun to do. So, he joined the military. Upon graduating from North Carolina State ROTC program, he completed pilot training at Craig AFB in Alabama. For the next four years he flew F102 Delta Dagger’s in Texas and then in Germany where he learned the finer points of flying interceptor missions and the basics of air-to- air combat.

It was inevitable that Furr would be sent to Vietnam, so he volunteered before receiving orders. The Air Force offered him a job as a combat forward air controller flying the high-end OV10 Bronco. “It was a great airplane: two-seater, high-wing with great visibility,” said Furr. For the next four months, he flew over the Ho Chin Min Trail leading insertions and extractions for long-range reconnaissance patrols. Some missions required the OV10 pilot to coordinate gunships and close air support while working with his back-seater, a Special Forces soldier, who communicated with teams on the ground.

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It was the winter of 1929, Mr. and Mrs. Jeter Gardner became the proud parents of their one and only baby boy, Hugh Gardner. Being an only child, they never expected him be drafted; but he was. Gardner went to the draft board and said he was not going to go. The draft board had something else in mind. While having a conversation on a pay-phone, the bus pulled up, two MP’s walked over, hung up the phone, and with hand-cuffed coercion, put him on the bus bound for Ft. Riley, Kansas.

At the age of 21, Gardner found himself “volunteered” as an Airborne Ranger and had a unique training experience. While stationed at Fort Benning, Georgia, he received specialized, special-ops jungle warfare training by the famous “Merrill’s Marauders” prior to his deployment to Korea attached to the 25th Infantry Regiment Division.

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In 1969, Scott Hansen, better known as “Scotty”, found himself drafted and on his way to Vietnam. Unsatisfied as being assigned as a truck driver and longing to do more, he volunteered for the infantry but his request was denied. Two weeks lapsed and he found himself assigned to the 1st Calvary Division AirMobile and lived a continual adrenaline rush, flying troops in or out, supplying ammunition, food and occasionally medevacs.

One night along the Cambodian border, Hansen and his crew flew in to rescue two wounded soldiers. On the return flight to the firebase, the crew deviated from their regular flight pattern to allow for a successful landing and off-loading in the kill zone. They were completely blacked out, landing next to the medical bunker between two rows of Concertina wire causing confusion to the enemy which allowed the helicopter to depart the area. During the chaotic exit, they discovered an unidentified man on board. To remove the interloper, the crew risked circling back around and with skids of the helicopter just above the ground, Hansen grabbed him and tossed him out. As the helicopter departed for the second time, violent vibrations suddenly rocked the chopper causing major damage to the main rotor and tail boom. Based on the condition of the chopper, mechanics were stumped on how it flew back; it should have crashed. Hansen shared, “I said a lot of prayers that night for a safe return.”

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On April 22, 1969, just two months before he graduated from high school, Lynn Higgins joined the United States Army. After completing basic training, he moved on to primary helicopter flight school at Fort Wolters, Texas.

While training at the Advanced Flight School, two months prior to his graduation, Higgins received deployment orders. In September, 1970, he arrived in Vietnam as the newest soldier assigned to B Troop, 7th Squadron, 1st Air Cavalry Division, 1st Aviation Brigade.

While in Vietnam, Higgins flew the OH-6 light observation helicopter nicknamed the “Loach” that provided fire support as part of the Hunter-Killer Team. Their mission was to attain contact with the enemy with the goal to engage and destroy, gain intelligence, develop the situation, survey and scrub landing zones in order to bring in ground troops.

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Growing up in a family that carries on the family name, Choice Kinchen IV knew deep inside he would be the one to make a difference. This started when he was taken to airshows and learning about the military. He set his mind early that he wanted to be on the frontline and in the action. In 2000 after graduation and one year before the 9/11 attack, Kinchen joined the Army where he found himself attached to Alpha Company, 3rd Battalion, 7th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division.

In 2003 Kinchen was deployed to Iraq with his unit and appointed Team leader. Upon their arrival, they waited for the inevitable to occur. March of that year the world learned of Operation Iraqi Freedom while Kinchen lead his team as the first U.S. Soldiers to cross the border into Iraq.

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Raised in North Ogden, Franklin D. Maughan, Jr., better known as “Frank”, graduated from Utah State University with a dual major in political and military sciences. He completed ROTC, earning his 2nd Lieutenant commission and went on to training at Fort Knox, Kentucky with the US Army’s Armored 665th.

In 1966, Maughan volunteered for his first tour in Vietnam. Within 24 hours of his arrival, he was greeted with “It’s all yours,” by the officer he was there to replace and then told he had one day to figure out how to command a tank platoon. With less than a third of the requested tanks, armored personnel carriers, and troops, his outfit went on patrol of the main thoroughfare to Saigon becoming fully enthralled in battle against a full regiment of Viet Cong that morning.

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Clarence A. Patnode, Jr., better known as Bud to his friends and family, was born in Churubusco, NY in 1932. After graduating high school, he continued his education by attending college earning a BS in Mathematics. In 1954, he was commissioned into the Army as a Second Lieutenant of Infantry.

In 1957, as a pilot in the 191st Assault Helicopter Company, Patnode was sent out to rescue survivors from a C-124 airplane that lost 2 engines and went down just after takeoff into a river. In a H-13 helicopter, he discovered the plane had broken in half. He hovered over the ice to allow people to climb in the helicopter and then landed on ice that was heading out to sea, pulling 14 people from the mud. On his next attempt to save additional survivors, he bottomed out the collective on the H-13, over-torqued it allowing him to ‘hop’ the helicopter to the bank of the river to pull 19 more people from the mud without damaging the H-13.

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Summer Anderson Thatcher built her identity, career, and lifestyle by getting really tough from a very young age. She learned to be “full on, all in, all the time” in attitude and practice.

In 2000, Thatcher enlisted in the Navy assigned to an aircraft carrier as a photographer’s mate. She was later accepted into the Department of Defense’s elite program for advanced broadcast journalism and documentary arts projecting her to became a top-flight videographer. When stationed out of Combat Camera Pacific, embedded within an Army unit as a combat cameraman in Iraq, she became a “desert sailor”.

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