Jan is someone I am honored to call a friend. It took us nearly three years before we met face to face.
I had joined Operation Just Cause and asked for the name of a Marine POW so that I could build a Web Site in his name.
Since I was from New York, and my son was also in the Corps, I felt it was the military branch to choose.
The name I was sent was "Major Francis E. Visconti, USMC" from Syracuse New York. He was reported MIA in November of 1965. The synopsis I was sent just didn't tell me enough. I wanted to know more. I wanted questions answered.
It's amazing what you can find out and who you can find if you keep poking your finger!
Little by little more information and people who wanted to "talk" found their way to Frank's Page. The bonus was finally getting in touch with Frank's wife Jan. To say that she was leary about my intentions or my dedication would be putting it mildly. After I gave her full editorial approval, she became my biggest support. Giving this approval is not something a "wannabe" writer gives freely!!
For several years I had worn a bracelet with the name of Lt. Lonnie Pat Bogard, USAF from North Carolina. In 1976 it went missing while I was in the hospital giving birth to my fifth child. I decided it was time to replace the bracelet. And that road led me to Frank, his wife Jan and his children.
I'm pleased to say that it also led Jan to several old friends and many who served with Frank and remembered him.
Opening up for many of those who made it back was very hard...survivor guilt..a new phrase to me, but not to Jan.
Jan and I e-mailed and spoke on the phone several times. I was in New York and she was in Orlando. I had no knowledge of "html" or designing, but I did have the desire. My daughter-in-law, Debbie, had the knowledge and together we created a gift of love for Jan.
Every "hit" on Frank's page was confirmation that he was not forgotten!
Two years ago I finally had a "sleepover" with my "Long Distance Sister". During a visit with my son and his wife in Springhill, Florida I decided it was time to meet my friend.
I got off the bus in Orlando not knowing what she looked like, but recognized her immediately.....
Jan is a proud, fiercely independent, iron willed Italian woman
with the dignity that age and pain brings to the few who survive.
She is tiny - my daughter in law calls it "no bigger than a minute"
and she seems too frail to have shouldered the burden of loss that
this country has saddled her with. Her health isn't what it should be,
but neither is her happiness at times. She should be relaxing into
her golden years rather than fighting battles with silent government
officials. She was a glowing auburn doll in her youth but now her hair is
silver. It is her eyes and spirit that glow these days. She can light
a room with her smile or...she can light a fire with her words. She's
one in a million but I believe in my heart of hearts that she could be
MORE...that her life should be so very different...
I believe in my heart, we have our government and some of it's leaders
to thank for her poor health. It never ceases to amaze me that even
with her losses she finds time to fight battles for others and lends
her strength and voice to those in need of her time and talents.
My interest in the POW/MIA situation had never been put to rest
as it had been for a great many American's after 1975. We had
been told that ALL POW's had been returned, but somehow the
numbers just didn't add up.
Over the ensuing years the situation would
resurface and I'd write a few letters and then return to the business
of being a MOM. Having five children took up the major portion of my
time and energy.......and my committment to the cause
which now consumes me was put aside.
That all changed in the winter of 1997. I had heard so much about
"The Wall" and decided that I was ready for a visit that I knew,
from others, would be difficult. Somehow the word difficult
is a grand understatement. I had been to the Holocust Museum
and that had been difficult but I could not relate to it in
the same way as those who had survived it. It was a part of
history that I studied in school. It wasn't "my" war and although
I cried and felt angry for the horrible waste. It was history for
me now to be remembered, to be told again and again
lest we forget that it was all TRUE!
But it was not "MY" war.
VietNam was "MY" war. My generation, my nephew's
generation, boys I had gone to school with were fighting
this new "War"....though it was never truly given the title
of "WAR" ....it didn't have a nick-name, (I can still remember
my Dad referring to the BIG ONE - WWII!) It didn't seem
to have an honorable purpose that we as Americans
could fully understand. Those young men who served
believed in America "right or wrong" because they
believed that what they were doing would be looked upon
with pride and their sacrifice would be reveared.
Little did they know that it would take years after "Homecoming" to fully realize that
we as a people had been lied to...they did not ALL come home in 1975 as Nixon and Kissinger announced!
There had been no parades, no ticker tape,
no flags flying for those who made it back before 1975.
It would 17+ years to honor the sacrafice of those who had made it HOME!
Some had been spat upon...my young nephew had served
two tours and when he landed at Andrews Air Force Base on a
stretcher with tubes from every vein and his throat shot out,
there were no cheers only shouts of "Baby Killer" as he laid
blessedly unconscious to those upstanding Americans who
spat upon him and the uniform he wore. And of those we left
behind we tried to forget. If we remembered them it would
be encumbant upon us to force our government for
a true accounting. "Truth" and "government" are not always synonymous. It is that ACCOUNTABILITY that
keeps Jan fighting The truth is so little to ask considering
how much was taken from her and her children and
grandchildren...just the TRUTH!
"UNACCOUNTED FOR IS UNACCEPTABLE" - JAN'S CREED AND CRY!
So who is Jan Visconti?
SHE IS MY HERO AND ALLOWS ME TO SHARE HER AMERICAN HERO
Major Francis E. Visconti, USMC - MIA/POW/KIA - SVN 1965
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"POOR IS THE NATION THAT HAS NO HEROES, BUT BEGGERED IS THE NATION THAT HAS AND FORGETS THEM
