A book that will be formally launched later this month is a collection of biographies and a heartfelt tribute to more than four dozen young men who attended Iowa Central Community College before their lives were taken in the Vietnam War.
T.J. Martin, Dean of Iowa Central’s Distance Learning Department, coordinated the book project that chronicles the lives of the former students from the 1960s and ’70s.
Martin says, “There’s 55 different individuals from Iowa Central’s nine counties who grew up in this area, went off to Vietnam, and unfortunately, didn’t make it home from Vietnam.”
The book is called “Before They Were Soldiers” and it aims to preserve the narratives of the young men who once lived as brothers, students, farmhands, baseball players, grocery clerks, and more — before answering the call of duty.
“The book, as its titled, ‘Before They Were Soldiers,’ is just that,” Martin says. “We wanted to learn who they were before going into the military, into the service and going eventually over to Vietnam. So the book was to learn about who these guys were growing up as a small-town kid in north-central, northwest Iowa.”
The college’s Fort Dodge campus will host a reception on April 22nd to which the families of the 55 have been invited. Students who worked on the project conducted interviews with those family members over many months to compile the book as a memorial to those who paid the ultimate price for our freedom.
“We’ve met with some of these individuals over the phone and via Zoom and other ways. Sometimes they were in-person interviews that we conducted, but in some facets, we didn’t have a chance really to get to know the families very well,” Martin says. “This event is to bring those families back here and to honor their loved ones who went off to Vietnam.”
The reception and book launch is scheduled for 2 PM on the 22nd at Decker Auditorium in the Center for Performing Arts. The book can be ordered through Amazon for $12.
ICCC’s service area covers: Buena Vista, Calhoun, Greene, Hamilton, Humboldt, Pocahontas, Sac, Webster and Wright counties.
(By Pat Powers, KQWC, Webster City)