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Volume 104 • Number 21 • Friday, January 31, 2014 • PO Box 188 • 111 E. Jenkins • Maryville, MO
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Bearcat trophy tour to include local events
KEVIN BIRDSELL/DAILY FORUM
Icy morning road conditions
A Ford Explorer was involved in a one-vehicle accident Thursday morning on U.S. 71 Highway approximately 12 miles north of Maryville. According to witnesses, the Explorer was westbound, about a quartermile west of the State HIghway AB intersection, when icy road conditions caused the driver to lose control of the vehicle. As the driver attempted to make corrections, the Explorer left the road, hit the ditch, and flipped. An ambulance was present on the scene for precautionary reasons.
A glimpse of Vietnam
MARYVILLE, Mo. – Northwest Missouri State has announced dates for a Championship Trophy Tour celebrating the football program’s 2013 NCAA Division II national championship. The tour, which is being hosted by the Northwest Alumni Association and the Northwest Foundation, will include five stops beginning Friday, Feb. 21. The undefeated Bearcats won the program’s fourth national championship with a 43-28 victory over LenoirRhyne on Dec. 21 in Florence, Ala. The game marked Northwest’s eighth appearance in the national championship game. “It’s incredible how many Bearcat fans there are throughout the Midwest and across the country,” head football coach Adam Dorrel
said. “Winning a national championship is something that everyone who cares about Northwest should be able to celebrate, no matter where they live. Being able to bring a championship trophy to our fans who have supported us throughout is a great feeling.” Dorrel, Director of Athletics Mel Tjeerdsma and Northwest President John Jasinski will be present at all five stops and will be available to answer questions and sign autographs. Fans will be able to take photos with the championship trophy and pick up an exclusive championship poster at each event. There will be an opportunity for fans to bid on auction items at each event, including a football, a helmet and a jersey. See NORTHWEST Page 6
SUBMITTED PHOTO/BILL MEDSKER
Above: U.S. pilots wash helicopters in a river near the An Khe base camp during the Vietnam War. Pilot Bill Medsker, the featured speaker at Wednesday’s meeting of the Hawk Road Flyers, said the river was the only source of water large enough for the task. Right: Medsker, poses with a coded mission map of Vietnam and a hat of the type commonly worn by North Vietnamese soldiers.
STEVE HARTMAN/DAILY FORUM
Chopper pilot recalls Vietnam experiences By STEVE HARTMAN Staff writer
“The Army told me they’d teach me to fly, so I took them up on it.” Those were the words of guest speaker Bill Medsker, who addressed a group of interested locals at the Northwest Regional Airport Wednesday night. The presentation was hosted by the Hawk Road Flyers, the local chapter of the Experimental Aircraft Association. Medsker, an avid photographer
who served two tours of duty in Vietnam, included numerous photos of his experiences there during his presentation. Many were aerial photos taken while he was piloting either the H-13 Scout or the Bell UH-1 Iroquois helicopter, both commonly referred to as “Hueys.” “I learned to fly all of the Hueys,” Medsker said. “There’s not a lot of difference in each model, but each feels a little different when you first fly it.” Medsker joined the U.S. Army in 1961 and spent four years as a crew chief responsible for the
repair and maintenance of helicopters before being accepted into flight school in 1965 at Fort Wolters. At the time the base, located near Mineral Wells, Texas, was the primary U.S. helicopter training facility. “As soon as we graduated from flight school at the end of 1965, we were immediately sent to Saigon (in what was then South Vietnam),” Medsker said. From there, Medsker was assigned to the 1st Cavalry Division HHR, 1st Brigade. Their base camp was located in Ah Khe, which was home to about
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400 helicopters as well as fixedwing aircraft. “The biggest nuisances in camp were mosquitoes, rats and flooding,” Medsker said. “If you think you’ve seen hard rain here, it was nothing like the rains we experienced in Vietnam.” One of Medsker’s primary duties as a helicopter pilot was to circle battlefields at high altitude, so the officers who rode with him could observe the battle and call in support as needed, or “direct traffic” as Medsker described it. “It wasn’t that exciting,” Medsker said. “We were up high
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enough that anything the North Vietnamese shot at us couldn’t actually reach us. “I was able to take a lot of pictures while on these assignments. Each Huey had two pilots, so it wasn’t difficult to pilot the helicopter and shoot pictures with one hand.” Medsker used a Kodak 35-millimeter camera to take his shots and mailed the film back to the United States, where it was developed and the photos mailed back to him in Vietnam. “My first camera was stolen out See VIETNAM Page 6
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