Thank you for your service to our country so long ago sir. I am heartened you returned home after the passage of so many years though I wish it had been under very different circumstances.

I bought a POW/MIA bracelet from a local military surplus store when I was in high school with his name on it!!! I wore it for many years straight. I am glad he was found and brought home to rest… thank you for this ultimate sacrifice.

As an ordnance Marine who served with him in VMFA-334 in Vietnam, I spoke with him often as he was inspecting his bomb load before taking off on his missions. We all knew that there was a great possibility that mission could be his last moments on earth, but he always faced each mission with no fear because he knew he was saving his Marine brothers on the ground. Thank you for your ultimate sacrifice! Semper Fi' Lt. Ryan!

Dear Lt William Ryan, Thank you for your service as a Naval Flight Officer. Glad you were found, Welcome Home. Saying thank you isn't enough, but it is from the heart. Veterans’ Day is soon. Time passes quickly. Please watch over America, it stills needs your strength, courage, guidance, and faithfulness, especially now. Rest in peace with the angels.

A Marine radar intercept officer missing nearly 48 years after he was shot down over Laos during the Vietnam War has been accounted for after his remains were found last year, the Bergen Record reports.

The remains of Marine Corps Reserve 1st Lt. William (Billy) Ryan, of Bogota, N.J., were identified through DNA tests conducted by the Defense Pow/MIA Accounting Agency at the Pentagon, the paper reported Friday.

Ryan’s plane crashed on a combat mission in southern Laos near the Vietnam border on May 11, 1969, the day before his son’s first birthday.