Larry Aime d’Entermont
Larry graduated from York High School in 1966. He was remembered as a well-liked, quiet and respectful man. He played football for three years and was a starting guard on the 1965 State Championship football team, proud to be a key contributor to an undefeated season. He also played high school volleyball and golf, and was a member of the Tumbling Club. Known affectionately to his friends as “Digger,” Larry was selected to Boy’s State in 1965.
Larry belonged to the 173ed Airborne Brigade. He was killed during the battle at Dak To, Kantum Province in South Vietnam.
Barry Waddell 17 May 2021
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Larry was born on March 29, 1948 and enlisted in the US Army after graduating from York High School. Larry completed training which included Army Jump School and came home for a short leave before being deployed to Vietnam to become part of Company D, 1st Battalion, 503rd Infantry of the 173rd Airborne Brigade.
Private First Class Larry d’Entremont was killed in action on November 20, 1967 at the age of 19. He died at the battle for Hill 875 in Dak To, Kon Tum Province in the Central Highlands of South Vietnam. This Provence shares borders with both Laos and Cambodia.
Larry was the first of two York soldiers to die in this battle which has been described as one of the “hardest-fought and bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War.” The interested reader can easily find a well sourced and detailed Wikipedia account of this action.
Larry Aime d’Entremont is buried in the First Parish Cemetery in York, Maine and further honored on Panel 30E, Row 40 of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC.
Compiled by Michael A. Dow 2022
Gerald Andrew Dorr (Gerry)
Gerald Andrew Dorr (Gerry) was born in York, Maine, July 5, 1944. He was the son of
Kenneth Ross Dorr and Marion Hooper Dorr.
He spent the first seven years of his life in York, lived in York Village and attended elementary school in York.
At the age of seven, Kenneth and Marion divorced and his mother moved to Gardiner, Maine. He was enrolled in school in Gardiner and attended schools until he dropped out of school his sophomore year in Gardiner High School. His grades, after elementary school, were usually dismal and it was regarded as a lack of effort. While having difficulty attaining good grades, he was a social being with many friends.
He did the “usual” things as a child growing up, attending church camps, operating a paper route and rooting for the Red Sox. He had all the usual collections of sports cards, bottle caps and 45-rpm records. He would also occasionally bring home a stray dog or cat in need of shelter.
He made the local news as a sixth grader by catching a large bass in Tacoma Lake (with a cousin and another friend) by using potato chips as bait. According to the story, Gerry jumped into the water and grabbed the large bass by hand. A picture accompanied a short article written in the Kennebec Journal. (Nobody ever knew whether the story was true or not, but Gerry swore it was!)
Gerry became active in the Forest Fire Prevention program and posted fliers, stickers and posters about the town of Gardiner. He received state recognition for his efforts and received an award for his participation. I remember seeing the colorful posters of Smokey the Bear piled up in the bedroom (one we shared), later to be attached to telephone poles and trees in and around the town.
Gerry also became active as a “junior firefighter” at the Gardiner Fire Department. Before and after dropping out of high school he spent many hours at the fire station in a volunteer capacity. He became active again after his Navy stint and resurrected a Civil Defense\Rescue Vehicle for the department.
He enlisted in the US Navy on his 17th birthday and went to boot camp at Great Lakes Naval Training Center. He subsequently became a parachute rigger and served on the aircraft carrier USS Lake Champlain. One of his duty stations was at Quonset Point, Rhode Island and he occasionally would bring two or three buddies home for a long weekend. These were fun times for the family and no one ever seemed to mind the unannounced intrusion.
Gerry was good with his hands and quite mechanically inclined and loved to tinker with cars. He wrecked his 1955 Mercury sedan and also rolled over my mother’s car on a back road on one of his leave periods from the Navy. No one was hurt in either accident, but both cars were totaled.
After his separation from the Navy, during which he had attained his GED, Gerry took a job driving a dump truck for a local construction company, but soon became bored. He tinkered with going back into the military again and decided to check out all the branches. He became very excited when he learned of the Army’s Warrant Officer Training Program…and the fact that he could become a helicopter pilot, so he signed up with becoming a helicopter pilot the goal.
He successfully went through all of the training that was necessary, was promoted to Warrant Officer and received his wings. He was very, very proud of his accomplishment.
Upon graduation at helicopter school, he was given orders to Viet Nam. He returned home for 30 days of leave. He became engaged to a young lady from Augusta, Maine during this leave. They decided they would be married upon his return from Viet Nam.
He was excited about his assignment to Viet Nam and professed his absolute belief in the necessity of the war and supporting the country that he loved.
My mother and I (along with his fiancée) went to see Gerry off from Augusta Municipal Airport. It was the last time I saw Gerry. He shook my hand and said to take care of Mom. He turned and walked out onto the tarmac and boarded the plane…never looking back. We waited until the plane took off and the three of us took a long, quiet ride back to Gardiner.
Gerry was missing in action for a couple of weeks, during which time the letters kept coming. There was a small delay in mail coming from Viet Nam at the time. Gerry had also written a letter given to a fellow serviceman to mail in the event of his death. It arrived after Gerry’s status had been changed to killed in action and in the letter he professed (once again) a strong belief in his mission, his county and God. He wanted to be buried in Arlington, VA.
Gerald Andrew Dorr was buried at the Arlington National Cemetery in February of 1967. At the start of the military funeral, it snowed heavily but as the caisson bearing his body crested a hill toward the burial site, the snow stopped, and before the end of the ceremony, the sky turned a bright blue, quite striking in the clean white snow. I remember thinking that it was appropriate for the burial of a son of Maine.
Ronald Allen Parsons
Ronald Allen Parsons was born on July 3, 1944 to parents Clayton J. and Elizabeth “Betty”
Parsons. He and his contemporaries grew up in a York that was much less structured and far
more spontaneous for kids then the more organized and scheduled model we now see. One of his
childhood friends remembers that “as kids we played down by the river, on the Mill pond and
literally everywhere in York. We had no sports programs or any programs. We just played. Out
in the morning and back at night.” Ronnie is remembered by friends he grew up with as being
playful, lighthearted, amusing and “lots of fun.” His mom, Betty remembered that he loved
working outside and that he loved animals.
According to a January 16, 1969 Portsmouth Herald newspaper article, Ronnie was “A native of
York” who attended York Schools and graduated from Berwick Academy in 1963. He studied at Nichols College, Worcester, Mass., leaving in his third year to enlist in the Army. His basic
raining was at Ft. Bragg, N.C., advanced infantry training at Ft. Gordon, GA., graduated from
the Army Paratrooper School at Fort Benning, Georgia and became part of the 173’d Airborne
Brigade. When home on leave his mom related how proud he was of his highly polished jump
boots and what it took to earn them.”
Ron’s tour of duty in Vietnam began on Apr 15, 1967 with Company C, 1st Battalion, 503rd
Infantry, 73rd Airborne Brigade. In a York Weekly newspaper article from 1998, Ronnie’s mom
said that his first “letters home were typed because he was assigned office duties within his unit.”
However, spending some time with office duties did not keep Ron from going on patrols where
he felt great sympathy for hungry young children he would meet in villages they went through.
Private First Class Ronald Parsons was mortally wounded on November 11, 1967 during the four
day battle for Hill 875 in Dak To, Kon Tum Province in the Central Highlands of South Vietnam. According to his mother Betty, Ronnie was shot in the back of the head when he took
over for a machine gunner who had himself just been shot. Due to the seriousness of his injury,
PFC Parsons was medevacked to Camp Drake Japan and his parents were flown to Japan via
military transport to be with their son. Ronnie lived six weeks after he had been wounded but
never regained consciousness. He died on Christmas Eve, 1967 at the age of 23.
Ronnie Parsons and Larry d’Entremont were two of York’s young soldiers to be killed in action
in Vietnam in the Battle of Dak To – Hill 875 which lasted between November 3 and November
23, 1967 and has been described as one of the “hardest-fought and bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War.” The interested reader can easily find a well sourced and detailed Wikipedia
account of this action.
Ronald Allen Parsons is buried in the First Parish Cemetery in York, Maine and further honored
on at Panel 32E, Line 55 of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC.
Compiled by Michael A. Dow 2022
Bob Young
Robert B. Young was born on July 4, 1949 and grew up loving fast cars and Harley Davidson motor cycles. The oldest of three kids, Bob loved the outdoors and with brother Dennis spent many hours in the woods hunting and trapping. Bob always loved adventure and his sister Susan remembers that in the winter he and Dennis would go to York River, and ride down river on the ice flows. He played football at York High School but dropped out and enlisted in the army.
The photograph of Bob that was used for the Fallen Heroes street banner was taken in the earlier part of his service. The patches on his fatigue shirt indicate he had achieved the rank of Private First Class and was serving in the Alaska Defense Command (ADC).
The ADC saw to the defense of the Alaska Territory of the United States and included the Nike Hercules air defense system, which provided a nuclear shield for strategic Alaskan military bases from 1959 to 1979. This defense system was also a deterrent against Soviet bombers flying over Alaska, the shortest distance between Russia and the United States.
Bob was an MP within this unit and later in his enlistment he was deployed to Vietnam as a Combat MP guarding truck convoys where he experienced combat first hand.
Having served his enlistment time, Bob received his honorable discharge and came home. For many returning soldiers, civilian life seemed unexciting, slow and boring. For some, this new “normal” was a blessing. For many others, being deprived of the survival stimulant adrenaline can be difficult to devastating as they have become addicted to action. Better understood in the modern era and given names like Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), society and soldiers still look for solutions.
Down through the ages, men returning from war have stories that are so deeply shattering that to share those with others is difficult. Few combat veterans want people to look at them as the person they had to be in order to survive those experiences.
Bob came home, got into trouble and was given a choice by a judge to either go to jail or go back into the Army. He chose the latter and on April 19, 1971was deployed to the 2nd Security Company, 10th Transportation Battalion, 124th Transportation Command in Cam Rann Bay, Vietnam.
Private Robert B. Young became a casualty of war and died in Cam Rann Bay on 22 April, 1971. Bob is buried in the First Parish Cemetery, York, Maine and is honored by being on Panel 03W – Row 003 of the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington DC. He was 21 years old.
I met Bob between his two stints in the Army and have good memories of him. Bob was the only person who took the time to ask me about my year in Vietnam, which I found very helpful.
Compiled by Michael A. Dow 2022