Saving a Seat at the Table

They left their homeland behind, bound for faraway shores where, quite often, they bled and died – and stayed.

More than 83,000 service men and women were captured or, most often, went missing overseas during this country’s wars on foreign soil. From World War II through the Vietnam War, tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines - and even some civilians - remain unaccounted for.

On Friday, a few Doylestown-area veterans helped remind the world that too many families still are wondering what happened to those they loved.

Men from Doylestown VFW Post 175 set up displays at Central Bucks East and Central Bucks West high schools and the Bucks County Courthouse in honor of national POW/MIA day, which is the third Friday in September.

Their goal was to remind the living that the missing service members – all of whom are believed to be dead – still are unaccounted for.

“So many are still missing, and most people are not aware of this at all,” said Bob Staranowicz. “I hate to say it, but everyone is in their own little world. They just don’t care about the warrior, it seems, even though he gets a great reception when he gets home. People are complacent about it, unless they have a member of their family who serves.”

Staranowicz, who lives in Buckingham, is the adjutant for the Doylestown VFW Post 175. He served in the Army in the Vietnam War, and remembers his fellow compatriots who never returned.

Frank C. Parker III, of Quakertown, was one of them.

Parker took off on Dec. 29, 1967, in a C-130 from Nha Trang Air Base in South Vietnam. He was an electronic warfare officer, in charge of monitoring radar and using his technical skills to jam the North Vietnamese.

The unarmed cargo plane was to excecute two air drops, one of leaflets and another of supplies, deep inside North Vietnam. But the plane never returned to base. After several attempts to find the plane and its men, the entire crew was declared missing in action.

It wasn't until 1992 that Vietnamese citizens and government officials began turning over to the United States human remains, photocopies of identification cards and artifacts from a crash site.

In October 2000, the U.S. government announced that Frank C. Parker III and his 10 fellow crew members had been identified and were being returned to their families.

Today, three other Bucks County residents are among the 1,682 still missing from the Vietnam War. They include Air Force Capt. Donald P. Kemmerer, of Quakertown, Air Force 1st Lt. Walter H. Sigafoos III, of Richboro, and Army Specialist 4th Class Clifford VanArtsdalen of Plumstead.

Sigafoos was the navigator on a two-man fighter jet hurtling over Laos on April 25, 1971. Gunfire tore into the Air Force jet, and Sigafoos and Capt. Jeffrey C. Lemon were never heard from again.

Kemmerer, too, was shot down and never seen again.

Witnesses saw VanArtsdalen killed in battle but were unable to retrieve his body during the fighting.

The number of Bucks County men who went missing during the Korean War is even higher. Eight Bucks men were lost between 1950 and 1953.

In the 60 years since then, only one has been identified.

Army Lt. Warner Harms went missing during a battle with Chinese forces near the Chongchong River in North Korea on Nov. 26, 1950.

Bones discovered buried in a farmer's field in 1999 were returned to the United States and underwent testing. Special DNA tests identified Harms in November 2001.

According to the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office, 1,682 remain missing from Vietnam, 125 from the Cold War, 7,985 from the Korean War, and 73,787 from World War II.