Jean Blassie holds a photo of her son Michael Blassie while seated in the living room of her apartment in Florissant, on May 2, 1998. Michael Blassie received an appointment to the Air Force and fell in love with flying immediately. Patricia still visits the tomb. One of the most memorable actors ever almost gave it up to be an Air Force pilot. Talk to the Veterans Crisis Line now That crypt would remain empty for over a decade. Thanks for your help! GREAT NEWS! Of those, 470 are considered non-recoverable. That is, death has been determined, but no remains can be recovered. To use this feature, use a newer browser. Sampley had come across some second-hand accounts suggesting that Americas only set of unknown remains from Vietnam had been recovered from an aircraft that had been shot down in 1972. With the conflicting information between the forensic analysis and the physical evidence, the remains were designated as "Unknown" and assigned the number "X-26.". ). Photo by Erik M. Lunsford elunsford@post-dispatch.com. The remains were reclassified as unknown when their projected age and height were judged not to match Blassie's.[1]. First Lieutenant Michael Joseph Blassie, 24, was shot down over South Vietnam in 1972 and presumed dead. They brought him home for burial in Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery near St. Louis. An email has been sent to the person who requested the photo informing them that you have fulfilled their request, There is an open photo request for this memorial. And he had only been able to find one missing plane that fully matched the planes description: Michael Blassies. Remove advertising from a memorial by sponsoring it for just $5. It has been watched over day and night since 1937 by a lone guard, forever marching back and forth in front of the tomb. Trailing the procession were Vietnam veterans, comparatively disheveled with beards, long hair, and jungle fatigues. By 1972, when Michael was deployed, Americas military presence in Southeast Asia was shrinking rapidly. Flying at a low altitude to drop napalm, he would have been propelled into the ground. But his tactics were confrontational and often involved outrageous claims and conspiracy theories. If you notice a problem with the translation, please send a message to [emailprotected] and include a link to the page and details about the problem. Your account has been locked for 30 minutes due to too many failed sign in attempts. Try again later. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have hallowed it far above our poor power to add or detract.". "Today was a significant day for us," Blassie's brother, George Blassie said during Friday's service. Real soldiers visiting the tomb have a very different perspective on this memorial than I could hope to imagine. Improvements in evacuation, recordkeeping, and forensic science meant that almost all US remains recovered from combat zones were identified. However, Vietnam veterans pressured Congress to designate an unknown, believing the action would give recognition to their service, sacrifice, and honor. Quickly see who the memorial is for and when they lived and died and where they are buried. She suffered a stroke in 2004 and recently was diagnosed with pneumonia, her family said Thursday. Still, as hesitant as he was,Gonzales thought maybe there could be more to the story. On July 10, Blassie's remains arrived home to his family in Saint Louis, Missouri and were later reinterred at Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. How to honor unidentified remains has always been one of the great conundrums of war. In 1991 the Department of Defense founded the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory (AFDIL). The sponsor of a memorial may add an additional. Then, as more information about those remains was discovered, only one set of remains remained unknown. A 1970 graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, he served in the Vietnam War as a 1st Lieutenant the 8th Special Operations Squadron. By the time the package arrived in Hawaii, the wallet and ID were missing, presumed stolen during storage or transit. At 67, Mrs. Blassie went back to work as a sales clerk at Dillards. After nearly two decades of uncertainty, the family of Blassie can finally reveal the empty crypt in which the men and women who served in Vietnam were buried, as well as the flag that was once flown over it. Sampley told them that remains had been discovered near Michaels crash site, along with items belonging to an Air Force pilot. well, that was simply too much to believe. I think a third section of these guards/ceremonies around the world would have been a great inclusion. I think I know where Michael is, he said, producing a paper trail that led to Arlington Cemetery. Jean Blassie lost her son twice. But for whatever reason, the first bad decision was not telling the family. Saint Louis, St. Louis City, Missouri, USA. They were initially classified as belonging to Lt. Blassie. Use Escape keyboard button or the Close button to close the carousel. Michael was 24 years old and 72 inches tall when he died. Its just an outsiders way of honoring all of your sacrifices. The guard was sent back and a different guard took over. Blassie was laid to rest beneath lush bluegrass in the cemetery's oldest section, established in 1826 alongside the original military post. He was shot down and killed while piloting his A-37B Dragonfly aircraft in the vicinity of An Loc, in South Vietnam. Please enter your email and password to sign in. Unlike nuclear DNA, each cell carries more than a hundred copies of mtDNA, since each cell contains many mitochondria but only one nucleus. To view a photo in more detail or edit captions for photos you added, click the photo to open the photo viewer. The report triggered a speedy response from the Department of Defense which, after its own investigation, ordered the Tomb to be opened and the Vietnam Unknowns remains to undergo DNA testing at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. She says shes not sure why she does it, but it means that shes gotten to know some of the guards. But in 1956, one small, seemingly innocent change to the formula of the Unknown would prove problematic: we began to add another set of unidentified remains for every subsequent war. On Friday, Family and friends gathered to welcome his return at Scott Air Force Base, near Blassie's hometown of Florissant, Mo., a St. Louis suburb. . It was around this time that David Railton came across a temporary grave, a few miles behind the front, marked only by a cross bearing the name of a regiment and the words: An unknown British soldier.. How much do you know about the founding of the U.S. Army? They were a match and Michael Blassies remains were returned to his family. That they all made the ultimate sacrifice for me. There, a plaque holds words from the Gettysburg Address: "We can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow this ground. All photos uploaded successfully, click on the
Done button to see the photos in the gallery. In honor of the Air Force's birthday, we've put together this Air Force history quiz. You can watch his conversation with Colonel Patricia Blassie on A Veterans Story on the VBCs YouTube channel, youtube.com/veteransbreakfastclub. Another perspective on this issue is that all soldiers are unknown. Her father died in a traffic accident when she was 9 or 10. In October of 1972, over five months after Blassies plane had disappeared into the jungle, Calhoon assembled a South Vietnamese patrol to enter North Vietnamese territory to find the wreckage. As far as she was concerned, the case was closed. The soldiers anonymity would allow each person who came to the grave to project whatever was most important to them onto the mystery. Sampley had no direct evidence proving Michael was in the tomb, but that didnt make him wrong. Visit the digital memorial page of Veteran Michael Joseph Blassie where you can share stories, photos, biographies, obituaries, tributes and more. Im a former Soldier from Australia, and a Tour Guide around Europe, and i immediately thought of all the different changing of the guards, and unknown Tombs i have visited. He basically sat on a shelf from 1972 to 1984, Patricia Blassie said. Blassie, a 24-year-old first lieutenant, had been missing since May 11, 1972, when his A-37 fighter was shot down over An Loc during a bombing run. The goal was to schedule the ceremony before Election Day 1984, which is why Memorial Day, rather than Veterans Day, was selected. Part 2: DNA. To Army scientists, these findings superseded any other evidence, such as documents or personal effects. Michael Blassie was therefore ruled out as a possible match. After petitioning the United States Government for permission, his family had his body exhumed. Thanks for using Find a Grave, if you have any feedback we would love to hear from you. Given the advance of DNA technology, there may never be another US Unknown. They were just looking out for him until he could go home. The date, location of the crash, bone fragments from the body and remnants of his flight suit and parachute led to the conclusion that it was Michael. Subscribe with this special offer to keep reading, (renews at {{format_dollars}}{{start_price}}{{format_cents}}/month + tax). With DNA identification being used and hearing that there are no unknowns from Vietnam and that they are working currently on unknowns from the Korean war, I though, How wonderful that there will never again be an unknown soldier, everyone will be eventually brought home. Your email address will not be published. It didnt matter if you wanted to honor all those who served or merely those who died, those who volunteered or those who were drafted, or even whether you were for the war or against it. But instead of giving closure, the remains endured one of the most baffling episodes of misidentification in military history. He related his story of wrapping the remains, with the dog tags, in plastic. [6] My parents marriage did not survive. In May 1998, the remains were disinterred for mitochondrial DNA "fingerprinting." Five months later, during a sweep of the area, a South Vietnamese Army patrol recovered a pelvis, an upper arm bone, and some ribs, as well as the remnants of a flight suit, a life raft, pieces of a parachute, and part of a USAF holster. I didnt even know how to go about college. Morphological approximation presumed that one could determine personal characteristics like age and height by careful examination of bone fragments. There they would rest for eight years in a file labeled X-26 until their date with destiny arrived. [5] On June 30, 1998, the Defense Department announced that the Vietnam Unknown had been identified. Drag images here or select from your computer for 1LT Michael Joseph Blassie memorial. The US Air Force responded with aerial counterattacks. He told her that he had been researching who was shot down on the date of Michaels death and he believed that her brothers remains were in the Tomb of the Unknowns. Blood samples were collected from Patricias mother and older sister. The discovery of personal effects at the crash site should have converted Michael Blassie from a Vietnam MIA to a KIA, closing his case. The next morning, he handed the package to a helicopter crew, which delivered it to the Saigon Mortuary. Patricia was proud also when he headed off to Vietnam six years later. Michael Sorkin is a reporter at the Post-Dispatch. 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