THE WALL OF FACES

Tom,

We are holding our 2nd (42nd anniversary) reunion in Houston, Texas on March 5-7, 2010. We still think of you often and will give special rememberance to you and our 5 other classmates & 2 TAC officers who gave the ultimate sacrafice.

FOREVER REMEMBERED

"If you are able, save for them a place inside of you....and save one backward glance when you are leaving for the places they can no longer go.....Be not ashamed to say you loved them....
Take what they have left and what they have taught you with their dying and keep it with your own....And in that time when men decide and feel safe to call the war insane, take one moment to embrace those gentle heroes you left behind...."

Quote from a letter home by Maj. Michael Davis O'Donnell
KIA 24 March 1970. Distinguished Flying Cross: Shot down and Killed while attempting to rescue 8 fellow soldiers surrounded by attacking enemy forces.

We Nam Brothers pause to give a backward glance, and post this remembrance to you, one of the gentle heroes lost to the War in Vietnam:

Slip off that pack. Set it down by the crooked trail. Drop your steel pot alongside. Shed those magazine-ladened bandoliers away from your sweat-soaked shirt. Lay that silent weapon down and step out of the heat. Feel the soothing cool breeze right down to your soul ... and rest forever in the shade of our love, brother.

From your Nam-Band-Of-Brothers

Never knew him, but my dad said he was a good guy...only 3 months into vietnam, and he was gone...I guess he was one of the lucky ones......

Tommy was a quiet studious type a year ahead of me at Lakeshore High in College Park, Georgia. He paid the ultimate sacrifice for doing the right thing when many others shirked their duty.Tommy knew we were there for each other and no one else. I am proud of him for doing the right thing.

As his OCS roommate, at Ft. Benning, Georgia,

he was a quiet , well mannered, compassionate young officer.