A Bracelet Can Be Removed

This report just aired on CBS Evening News:

March 7, 2011 - Kathy Strong was 12 years old when she put on a bracelet to keep vigil for a solider missing in Vietnam -- now it's time for her to take it off

 

While the war raged in Vietnam, POW/MIA bracelets were all the rage. The metal bracelets, sold by the millions, each bore the name of a soldier who was either still a prisoner in Vietnam, or missing in action.

CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman reports the idea was to wear the bracelet and only take it off your wrist when your Veteran came home.

They were very popular with kids. In 1972, when she was 12-years-old, Kathy Strong got a bracelet in her Christmas stocking.

"I was really excited," Strong said. "I read the paper that came with it. And I just thought. I'm going to keep it on until he comes home."

Strong, now 50, still remembers the name: James Moreland. Moreland was a Green Beret who'd been stationed in Lang Vei.

Moreland went missing in the winter of 1968 after the enemy over took his position. At the time, no one knew much more than that - so Kathy remained optimistic.

"They showed footage of the soldiers coming off the planes, and I always thought wherever he's flying into I'm going to be there and I'm going to give him my bracelet and I'm going to put it on his arm. That's how I always pictured it," Strong said. "But that wasn't meant to be." {continued}

As a Vietnam veteran, Navy '67-'71 All Shore GMG3 Vietnam '70-'71 last of my four years of service, I have worn a POW/MIA bracelet not starting as I came home but when we were trying to help in getting the OK for the Vietnam Memorial, The Wall, built on the Mall in DC. I choose not to just wear one of a brother lost that came from the same community as myself but to let them send me one at random, this is the name and information I've had on my wrist all these years:

This Navy brother has yet to return, as I still have the bracelet on my right hand wrist, name can't be read anymore, but I know it's still etched within!