Reading vigil remembers service personnel killed or missing in action

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Nadine Dugan Venzke solemnly placed a single yellow rose in the hands of the bronze figure of a soldier, part of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Reading's City Park.

The rose was in remembrance of her brother, Col. Thomas Dugan.

Dugan was 35 and serving in the Air Force when he went missing in Vietnam on Dec. 13, 1968.

He is one of 65 Berks Countians killed or missing in action in Vietnam between 1963 and 1973.

Their names are carved into the memorial's stone tablet.

The rose laying was part of a candlelight vigil Friday in City Park. The event commemorated National POW/MIA Recognition Day, observed on the third Friday in September.

The three-part program, sponsored by the POW/MIA Forget-Me-Nots and the Vietnam Veterans of America, Chapter 131, also recognized the 36th anniversary of the city's Vietnam War Memorial.

In advance of Agent Orange Remembrance Month, observed in October, the program honored veterans who died after the war of chemical exposure or other war-related injuries or illnesses.

Organizer Diane Simmons, secretary/treasurer of the Forget-Me-Nots, said that each year as she prepares the vigil, she tries to come up with something a little different.

"I try to think of a way to change it so it doesn't feel like we're doing or saying the same thing year after year," Simmons said. "Then someone said to me, 'You can't change the program because it's already written. It's carved in stone. It's compiled on a list.'"

Simmons said she saw the truth in that statement.

"The 65 names are engraved in stone," she said. "The list of POW/MIAs from all the wars that is compiled and published by the Defense POW Accounting Agency, the obituaries that are printed and published in the newspaper: They are the facts. They are the history. They are the legacy."

There is a saying, Simmons said, that the dead cannot be forgotten as long their names are still spoken.

"It is up to us, those of us who are still living, to be sure those who passed before us are never forgotten," Simmons said. "So every year, we gather here and we speak their names, we keep their memory alive."

The program began with a presentation of the colors by members of the Reading High School Marine Corps JROTC.

After recognizing the 81,198 still missing and unaccounted from all wars, yellow roses were placed in memory of Dugan and two other local veterans who also are listed as missing in action.

They are Air Force Capt. David Pannabecker, 33, of Womelsdorf, whose plane was lost over Cambodia in March 1972, and Air Force Lt. Col. Ralph Angstadt, 34, of Oley, whose plane was lost over the Tonkin Gulf, North Vietnam, in October 1966.

Although pieces of Dugan's plane were located in 2007, bone fragments did not reveal a DNA match. His family still considers him missing, though the Defense Department removed his name from the official list.

"The Dugan family was given a box of plane fragments, shreds of clothing, pins and buttons, but no proof it was Tom," Simmons said.

The ceremony included the reading of the other 62 names carved on the monument and the placing of a red rose for each.

Since the Vietnam War ended, Simmons said, thousands more have died from war-related injuries and illnesses related to exposure to chemicals, particularly Agent Orange.

Exposure to the chemical herbicide, used by the U.S. during the war to clear vegetation, has been linked to liver, lung and pancreas injury, tremors and other ailments.

"Their families and loved ones suffer with them as they watch them become disabled or are left behind after they die," Simmons said. "We must remember them as all the names that are engraved on the wall. They too are casualties of the war."

As each of the years from 1975 to 2024 was announced, those in the crowd of about 50 called out the names of the family members, friends and fellow service personnel who died of service-related conditions.

The service ended with a moment of silence for those whose names are not carved in stone.

Originally Published: September 21, 2024 at 6:46 a.m.