HASLETT, Mich. (AP) — A Lansing-area woman is trying to get her father’s name on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, 55 years after his plane disappeared in the Pacific Ocean.
Donna Ellis says the names of Sgt. Melvin Lewis Hatt and others are not on the black granite memorial because they didn’t die in the combat zone, although they were headed to Vietnam. She says there were nearly 100 Army Rangers on the plane.
Ellis says Hatt has a memorial stone at Arlington National Cemetery, although his remains were never recovered. She says she’s contacted the Army and might turn next to U.S. Sen. John McCain, who was a prisoner during the Vietnam War.
Ellis tells the Lansing State Journal that everyone aboard the plane deserves “to be recognized.”
