Preserving a nearly-lost legacy
jsteward
Following a talk about the Fallen Cougars Project in Pullman last Veterans Day, Kathy Aiken (’80 PhD history) shared a faded newspaper clipping with the speakers. The obituary for her father’s friend noted that he had—like Aiken’s dad— attended Washington State College for a year and a half before joining the United States Army to fight in World War II.
“Samantha and Ray looked at it, and said, ‘We don’t have this guy in our project.’ And it started us on this odyssey,” says Aiken, a professor emerita and » More …
For many years, she never spoke about World War II. “It was too difficult. You try to forget. You try to go on with life.”
A legendary quarterback, class president, and triple-sport letterman turned husband, father and high school coach. A first-generation college student and son of a modest farming family. A business major, fraternity brother, and newlywed turned Wildcat fighter pilot. An international scholar who left the Philippines to attend college 7,000 miles away … and never returned.