| In Vietnam on business, a Wheaton couple find American dog tags being sold for $20 by a street vendor. Now they hope to return them to veterans and their families. By Melynda Findlay Daily Herald Staff Writer August 06, 2001 
Martha Roskam's eyes fill with tears as she talks about finding a Vietnam street vendor peddling 36 American military dog tags as souvenirs. Passing them up at first, she went back to claim them after telling her husband, V.R. "Swede" Roskam, how disturbed she was knowing that such personal items might have meaning for the soldiers who once wore them or their families. "If I had lost a son (in combat), I would want anything that would honor his memory," she said. It is the beginning of a sort of mission for the Wheaton couple and their son, state Sen. Peter Roskam. The family Is now committed to finding out if the tags are legitimate and, if they are, returning them to the next of kin -- or the soldiers themselves if they are still alive. The couple came across the tags several weeks ago while in Vietnam on business. Martha Roskam was shopping for inexpensive gold jewelry or old coins on the wide boulevards of Ho Chi Minh City when she stopped to look at items being sold by a woman and her teenage daughter. Her eyes stopped on a basket of old Vietnamese coins. On top of the coins sat the dog tags -- dented, weathered and discolored metal tags with unfamiliar names. "I picked them up and just looked at them," she said. "I felt so sad." Still, she left them with the vendor and made her way back to her hotel, where she told her husband about her disturbing discovery. "My radar picked up on them," said V.R. Roskam, a veteran of the Korean War. "I told her, 'Go back, pay whatever you have to pay. Buy them." The next day, Martha Roskam paid $20 for all 36 tags. "We looked at them and they seemed legitimate," she said. If they are fakes, she said, someone has gone to a whole lot of trouble to trick an American tourist. The vendor's daughter said the tags, containing personal information such as blood type and religion as well as names and military ID numbers, came from the highlands of central Vietnam, where V.R. Roskam knew many battles had taken place. The couple returned home and handed the tags to their son. "Peter has more connections," his mother said. "I knew he'd know where to go." The state senator had each name entered into a spread sheet at his Glen Ellyn district office. He has contacted the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, part of the National Archives that keeps records of servicemen who are deceased, discharged or retired. If any of the names on the dog tags were in the database, it might be one more way to authenticate them. When Peter read a name and identification number from one of the tags to the woman on the other end of the line, her answer sent chills down his spine. "Yes, we've got him," she said. "Give me another one." He gave her another name and number. That man was in the database, too. "I almost started crying when I found out they are probably real," Martha Roskam said. "It's very touching for us. If these men are MIA, this could give their families some peace. The National Archives now has the complete list of 36 names and serial numbers, and Peter Roskam hopes to locate the families or soldiers. It's not yet known where the soldiers named were from. The younger Roskam says he hopes to deliver each tag himself. "I think it's important that we, as Americans, honor those people that served us," he said. "And Vietnam veterans many times came back and didn't receive the type of honor they should have. This is a matter of doing the right thing. We're going to do our best to get to the bottom of this." The family believes they've got at least two tags that are authentic so far, and for V.R. Roskam, that's definitely a good start. "Even if it's just one family, it's worthwhile," he said. "But we're two for two so far, so we're winners, regardless of how the rest turn out." Effort To Return Dog Tags 'Epitomizes The American Spirit' 
Rob Stiff wasn't even alive in 1968 when Lance Cpl. Allan George Decker made the ultimate sacrifice for his country. Still, the 27-year-old was so disgusted by the sight of the fallen Marine's dog tags being hawked for a few pennies at a Vietnam market that he and fellow Florida businessman Jim Gain returned months later to retrieve the tags and 639 others.
The men aren't alone. New Jersey newspaperman Jim Six bought 450 American dog tags for $120 in 1993 that were being sold in souvenir shops in Da Nang and China Beach. He still desperately seeks to return them to their rightful owners. An Arizona not-for-profit group and its volunteers have brought dozens of the metal trinkets to U.S. veterans or their surviving families. And, in the latest example, a Wheaton couple returned this summer from Vietnam with 36 dog tags. With a little help from their son, state Sen. Peter Roskam, the couple hopes to reunite the tags with families or the soldiers they represent. No government agency or private veterans organization takes on the task of returning such lost personal effects. Part of the problem is ensuring the dog tags - a big seller among American, Australian and French tourists in Vietnam - are the real deal and not just cheap fakes. Many private citizens such as Six and Stiff quickly learned reuniting the dog tags with soldiers or their families is no easy feat. But, for them, the arduous task has become a labor of love. "It's fitting they're doing it," said Brian Naranjo, a spokesman for the American Legion's national headquarters in Indianapolis. "The dog tags were for that very purpose - identification. It's something that person touched and it's important. "It would be great if more people were able to do that. Their effort epitomizes the American spirit and our love for our fellow Americans." Going back Jess DeVaney formed his foundation TOP (Tours of Peace) Vietnam Veterans in November 1998 to help his fellow vets heal. The Arizona group brings veterans to Vietnam twice a year to revisit the place where they were stationed and fought, as well as other sites. While there, members also try to recover personal effects left behind in Vietnam after the war, such as dog tags and clothing. "The personal belongings are both a remembrance and a way to honor the veteran's service," said DeVaney, a radio broadcaster. "They have value. Someone shouldn't just buy one and take them home as a souvenir to put on a shelf. They're not knickknacks." DeVaney recalls the reaction of a physically disabled veteran living on the East Coast upon hearing his dog tag had been recovered after so many years. The man told DeVaney he had been planning to commit suicide. To this day, the veteran swears the phone call saved his life. "Even though it's just a piece of metal, it's very symbolic to the veterans," DeVaney said. "Somehow, by some fate, that symbol made it into my hands after such a long journey. It's very emotional." 'I wanted them home' Jim Six was a police reporter for the Glouchester County Times in New Jersey in 1993 when he heard of the dog tag racket in Vietnam. A police chief had just returned from a trip and told him of a pile of rusty, old American dog tags for sale in a little souvenir shop in Da Nang. The source was returning to Vietnam for another medical mission. Six, still thinking about those dog tags, gave him $100 and asked him to buy them. "I didn't have any visions of matching them up with anyone," said Six, now a columnist and senior reporter. "It just really bothered me that they were there. I wanted them home." After pitching in $20 of his own, the police chief returned with 450 tags. Six sorted them out and compared the names to those engraved on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. Realizing how arduous of a task he had undertaken, Six set them aside for what he planned to be a short while. Seven years later, he remembered the pile of dog tags and again set out to find their rightful owners. Finally, Six got a match after enlisting help from friends and the Department of Defense's Office of Prisoners of War and Missing Personnel. The name was Marine Cpl. Dennis W. Hammond, who was captured in 1968 by the Viet Cong in Quang Nam Province, South Vietnam, just eight days before his tour of duty was to end. Though his body was never found, Hammond's fellow prisoners later would tell how he was shot in the leg while trying to escape, severely beaten, starved and how he eventually died after two years of captivity. He was 23. Officials contacted his sister, Carlene Tackitt in Mexia, Texas, to tell her his dog tags had been found. Six got a call almost immediately. He personally returned the tags to her in January. "It's hard work," Six said. "We didn't have anyone working on it full-time. "I wouldn't have missed it for the world. I just can't tell you, it was an amazing feeling. I would choke up whenever I told people about it." He is searching for an easier way to return the remaining 449 tags. 'It's a passion' Florida businessmen Rob Stiff and Jim Gain were shocked last January when they saw dog tags for sale in a back-alley market in Ho Chi Minh City. The two happened upon them while visiting Vietnam to check out the commercial climate. Gain works for a warehousing and distribution company, PMG Worldwide, and Stiff owns Magic Markers, which manufactures magicians' supplies. The tags were hanging on a string in a market not frequented by tourists. Back in America, they couldn't forget the sight. So much so that the two men returned in May and, after scouring the city and sorting through thousands of tags, some illegible or printed in Vietnamese, came home with 640. They paid $180 for the heap - some going for as cheap as 13 cents. So far, they've reunited about a dozen with their owners or the veteran's family and have matches to another two dozen dog tags they're about to Fed Ex out. The men refuse to accept a dime for the service. The men last month returned Lance Cpl. Allan George Decker's tags to his mother at the cemetery in Orlando, Fla., where he is buried. On Aug. 25, 1968, the 19-year-old Decker was killed in the Quang Nam province. Like the others, Stiff and Gain began trying to track down owners of the tags by finding their names on the black granite Vietnam Veterans Memorial. But, after myriad newspaper articles, television appearances and setting up a Web site (www.founddogtags.com) listing all the names engraved on the dog tags, the veterans and surviving families are coming to them. Stiff, for example, has received more than 6,000 e-mails from around the world, including one from a missionary in Italy who provided a lead for a name he found on the Web site. And, just the other day, Texas billionaire Ross Perot telephoned to offer his help. "At first I thought this was just a good charity," Stiff said. "Now, for me, it's a passion. I've had guys that are 52 years old crying on the phone, expressing their gratitude and appreciation. "Really, I should be thanking them. These people were never really thanked or recognized when they came home. It's just been a blessing to meet them." |