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Mpls Star Tribune Article 4-16-1988Staff Photo by Art HagerlAISO 5 . qmftAI(* I (��fr fAIL-w-TRilSk��, PAI& A Navy honor detail was on hanfFFriday at Chanhassen Cemetery for the burial of pilot Trent Powers, shot down over North Vietnam in 1965. Navy Vietn m pilot b ried -in Chanha en By Wendy S. Tai home, and maybe tomorrow morn- American service people unaccount- Powers. Staff Writer ing I can sleep in," she said. ed for from the Vietnam War. "I don't show up for these much," Capt. Trent Powers came home Fri- Powers, a Navy pilot, was shot down Of, them, 43 Minnesotans remain Hesselgrave said after the ceremony. day, over what was then North Vietnam missing, 'according to Dale Hanley, 6'After 12 years, I had to come and in 1965. director of Minnesota Won't Forget say goodbye to someone I didn't real - Under an evergreen whipping in a POW/MIA, a nonprofit group that ly know." chill wind, his family, colleagues and According to the Pentagon, he pro'ba- tries to keep the cause of the, missing other veterans buried him next to his bly died shortly after ground fire hit Americans alive. The burial marked the end of an grandmother in Chanhassen Ceme- his aircraft and forced him to para- ordeal for the Powers family. But fbT,- tery. chute behind enemy lines. He was Hanley was at the cemetery yester- the families of others who are still 35. day, as were about 35 other people, missing, the wait goes on. "My knees were shaking this morn- including Jim Hesselgrave, who wore ing, but they're steady now," his Last December, Alice Powers heard a bracelet with Powers' name for 12 Hesselgrave pushed up his right mother, Alice Powers, 87, said after that her missing son's remains had years. The first one broke about two sleeve, showing a bracelet and said, the ceremony that was punctuated by been identified by an Army laborato- months ago, and he put on a new "I already got a new one on. It's not the volleys of a 21 -gun salute. ry in Hawaii. one. over.V) It read: Lt. Col. William Cook, 4-18-68. "Et's, over. Now I'm going to go Powers was among more than 2,400 Yesterday, he handed both to Alice BRACELET: Manv, in. state Continued from page 1B memorial service in April. "I saw the name, Trent Powers," he said. "I thought, `He's back. He's home.' So I. took the bracelet off. I keep it on my dresser, in a place where I keep things that are impor- tant to me. "It's odd to not be wearing it," he said. "I'm used to people asking me what It is. I'm used to it catching on y coat in the morning." He said he'd like to send the bracelet to Powers' mother, "if she'd like to have it."" Alice Powers said she would, but it won't be the first. "I'm going to have a house full of brace- lets," she said. Joan O'Brien, director of the Minne- 1 Star Tribune/ Sunday/ March 13/1988 We thlF.�ir wrists wore �s narr��on J sofa League of Families of -POWs and MIAs, said thousands of Minneso- tans < < , tans have wornthe bracelets, and she I m happy to take (the bracelets) because it's estimated that 200 people have bracelets with Powers' name. Alice something that seems: to boost them. They've Powers said she has received some of been so good,wearing the bracelets for so those already. _ "I'm happy to take them because it's something that seems to boost" the people who wore them, she said. "They've been so good, wearing the bracelets for so many years, and if this. makes them feel better, that's fine. I'll do anything I can to show my appreciation." Neville said he enlisted in the Air Force early in 1975, "as they were phasing down" the American mili- tary presence in Vietnam. He had expected to be sent there, he said, and he would have gone if ordered. many years, and it tnis maKes tnem reel peer, that's. fine._ I'll do anything I can to shbw my appreciation." AllicePowers The U.S. involvement ended, but prisoners were left behind and other men were missing and not accounted for. Since long before the war ended, family and friends of the missing have tried to keep their cause alive. r "They come around every so often and sell the bracelets," Neville said. "You pay $3 for the bracelet, and that money goes to lobby for the MIA -POW cause." O'Brien said the bracelets have mat- tered in other ways.. They are re- minders to the people Who .wear or see them, she said. "And when the prisoners were released and came home, they said they knew about the bracelets. They had heard about them over there." Neville said he called the. Veterans of Foreign Wars occasionally to find out if Powers' remains had been found. When people asked about the brace- let, he told them what it meant and, what he knew about Powers. And he talked sometimes to Powers. "It's funny how, when you wake up in the morning, you think, `Well, Trent, we're going to put you. on.' Or when you go to church'... it was always in the back of my mind that God would feel that somebody out there really ca. red. "I always wondered about him: Who he was, where he was, how he was being tretiled if he was alive, what. condition he was in. I hoped he was alive. But then I'd wish he was dead so he wouldn't go through the pain",. and torture. I had really mixed emor _ tions about that. "You aiifays wonder about flie fa ­ il.y; too. What are they thinking? what's going through their minds? - That had to he painful. I always - wondered if he was married, if he had lids, what they were like. I won, dered what he"d be doing if he was back in the States. "You get prefly attached. You really do." Photo by Mary Thomas Force Staff Sgt- Dallas Neville held the MIA bracelet he wore for Five years in memory of Navy Capt. Trent Powers.. Air o g _ ..