Notes and announcements about South Puget Sound residents serving in the U.S. military. Send your news to me at mike.gilbert@thenewstribune.com

Maj. Donald Crider

Plucked last fall from teaching AP Physics at Stadium High School, Maj. Donald Crider of Tacoma these days is flying medevac missions in Iraq with the 126th Aviation Regiment. He is based in Amarah, in Maysan province, flying UH-60 Black Hawks in support of the 4th Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division out of Fort Hood, Texas.

“We are here for the soldiers (and) to make sure we can respond to any kind of medical help they would need,” Crider said in an Army press release. He added that his transition from the classroom to the cockpit only intensified his motivation to help the soldiers here.

“It’s moving to know you are the difference between someone living and dying.” (Aug. 6, 2008)

Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class Alex D. Landress recently completed naval nuclear power training at Ballston Spa, N.Y., to qualify to become a Naval nuclear operator. Landress, son of Lydia Quinby of Bonney Lake, joined the Navy after graduating from Sumner High School in 2006. (July 21, 2008)

Marine Corps Pvt. Travis J. Richard, a 2005 graduate of Sumner High School, recently completed the small-arms repair course at the U.S. Army Proving Ground at Aberdeen, Md. Richard joined the Marine Corps in September 2007. (June 30, 2008)

White

Air Force Lt. Caroline White, daughter of Drs. Lawrence and Donna White of Lakewood, won her age division in her first Ironman triathlon competition Sunday in Coeur d'Alene. She's a 2007 Air Force Academy graduate and a 2003 graduate of Bellarmine Prep. Next she's onto the Ironman World Championships in Hawaii in October. White is working on her master's degree at the University of Maryland and then will go to pilot training at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas.

An Ironman race consists of a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bike ride and a 26.2-mile run. (June 24, 2008)

I Corps and Fort Lewis NCO of the Year is Sgt. Daniel P. Dean from the 1st Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, and Soldier of the Year is Spc. Justin R. Brown of the 308th Brigade Support Battalion. Click here for Northwest Guardian coverage of the competition.

Two Tacoma-area soldiers -- Spc. Jeremy J. Bucholtz of Lakewood and Spc. Wayne J. Faga of Tacoma -- are back at Fort Hood, Texas, after a 15-month deployment in Iraq with the 1st Cavalry Division. Bucholtz is with the 2nd Battalion, 227th Aviation Regiment and Faga is with the 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry, according to an Army press release.

Bucholtz, a 1994 Lakes High School graduate, is the son of Laurel Smith and grandson of Lawrence Bell of Lakewood. Faga graduated from Lincoln High in 1996 and is the son of Foai and Faafoi Faga of Tacoma's East Side. (May 21, 2008)

[More:]

Hotis

Staff Sgt. Todd A. Hotis, a U.S. Army Reservist from Lakewood, returned home in late April after a 12-month tour as a driver, gunner and team leader in Baghdad with the Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq. He also spent three months before deployment in training at Fort Riley, Kan. Hotis is assigned to the Reserve's 104th Training Division out of Vancouver. (May 6, 2008)

Senior Chief Petty Officer David Jonason of Tacoma took command March 21 of the U.S. Coast Guard Station Chatham near Boston. Jonason, 39, has been a Coast Guardsman 21 years and was last assigned as an instructor at the service's National Motor Lifeboat School in Ilwaco. (March 28, 2008)

Pvt. 1st Class Arley Lange of Lacey graduated from the Army Military Police transisiton course at Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., on March 21. She will be assigned to the 16th Military Police Brigade (Airborne) at Fort Bragg, N.C. (March 24, 2008)

Photo: Sgt. Brad Willeford/U.S. Army

Pfc. Jeffrey Arnold of Tacoma – that's him on the left, the Army public affairs people assure us – is serving in the Taji area of Iraq with the 2nd Brigade, 25th Infantry Division. That's the Hawaii-based Stryker brigade that's been in Iraq a couple months now.

Staff Sgt. Ben Santiago of the Washington Air National Guard will be awarded the Bronze Star medal for meritorious service in Afghanistan. There's a ceremony at 1 p.m. Saturday, March 1, at Camp Murray. Santiago, with the 116th Air Support Operations Squadron, worked as a Special Operations tactical air control party – TACP – last March to September, according to a Guard press release. (Feb. 28, 2008)

Lance Cpl. Kristopher G. Murray, a 2007 graduate of Emerald Ridge High School, recently completed the Basic Food Service Course at Fort Lee, Va., according to a Navy press release. He also earned meritorious promotion to his rank. He joined the Marines in July 2007. (Feb. 13, 2008)

Capt. Matt Upperman of Puyallup – he's the tall guy in the back, to the left of Santa – is in Iraq with the Tatanka Team, a team of military training advisers to the Iraqi army. The others, from left to right, are Staff Sgt. Jeff Lewis, Capt. Matt Kotowski, Capt. Stephen Noel, Sgt. 1st Class Charles Thomas, Upperman, Maj. Steve Carpenter, Capt. Jeff Donaldson, Capt. Mitch Roberts, Sgt. 1st Class David Crow, Sgt. 1st Class Columbus Amosa and Staff Sgt. John Rich. Photo courtesy of Maj. Steve Carpenter, U.S. Army

Capt. Matt Upperman of Puyallup is deployed to Iraq as part of a Military Transition Team training an Iraqi infantry battalion. "He performs admirably as our intelligence officer, as a senior mentor-trainer for our Iraqi counterparts, and as a diplomat for the United States as our military continues to make steady gains toward stabilizing a country that has seen years of turmoil," his commander, Maj. Steve Carpenter writes to say. (Jan. 11, 2008)

Jeffrey J. Carbullido, son of Karen Ruiz and Jeffrey J. Carbullido of
Puyallup, was recently meritoriously promoted to lance corporal while serving with Headquarters Battalion, 3rd Marine Division, Okinawa, Japan. Carbullido is a 2006 graduate of Rogers High School and joined the Marine Corps in January 2007. (Jan. 10, 2008)

Crabtree

Jason Crabtree of Kingston, first captain of the corps of cadets at the United States Military Academy, has been named a Rhodes Scholar to study next year at Oxford in England.

As first captain, the future infantry officer is following the likes of Lee, Pershing and MacArthur, according to West Point alum and historian Tom Morgan of Steilacoom. There have been fewer than 100 Rhodes Scholars in the history of West Point, former Army Chief of Staff Gen. Bernard Rogers and Supreme Allied Commander Europe Gen. Wesley Clark among them.

Bios of all the winners are here.

"Needless to say all of us in the West Point Society of Washington and Puget Sound are enormously proud of him," Morgan said. "His achievements at West Point are the stuff that legends are made of. His accomplishments are enormous!" (Nov. 20, 2007)

Marine Corps Reserve Lance Cpl. Andrew T. Hickman, son of Cynthia and William Hickman of Eatonville, recently
graduated from the Bulk Fuel Specialist Course at the U.S. Army Quartermaster School at Fort Lee, Va. Hickman joined the Marine Corps Reserve in July 2003. (Aug. 23, 2007)

Navy Seaman Kelly E. Barnes, daughter of Marty and Keith Barnes of Tacoma, is serving aboard the hospital ship USNS Comfort on a four-month humanitarian mission in the Caribbean and Latin America. According to a Navy press release, they've cared for 25,000 patients in Belize and Guatemala, and will also visit Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guyana, Haiti, Nicaraqua, Peru, Suriname and Trinidad & Tobago.

(You can follow the Comfort's mission via the captain's log here and a route map here. Commanders also briefed the Pentagon press corps on the mission Tuesday; transcript here.)

Barnes is a 2004 graduate of School Of The Arts High School and joined the Navy in December 2005.

Army Spc. Aimee Collver, right, of Puyallup, and her buddy Spc. Vanessa Bolognese are medics working in and around Kirkuk, Iraq. Photo: Spc. Michael Alberts/U.S. Army

Spc. Aimee Colver, a 23-year-old from Puyallup, is working as an Army medic with the 3rd Brigade, 25th Infantry Division. She is assigned to the brigade command group's personal security detachment, regularly traveling on missions around northeastern Iraq.

She was featured in a recent Army public affairs story and said she loves her job but it's not what she expected when she enlisted.

"I’d been working in a nursing home after high school,” she said. “When I walked into the recruiter’s office I knew that I wanted a medical job. ... The health care specialist job was available, and I was told that I would be working in a hospital setting. Of course, I don’t work in a hospital and nothing out here in Iraq is anything like what I thought.”(Aug. 1, 2007)

Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Adam L. Boster, son of Cheryl L. Boster of Eatonville, recently graduated from the 25-week Aviation Logistics Tactical Information Systems Course with Marine Detachment, Athens, Ga. Boster is a 2005 graduate of Eatonville High School and joined the Marine Corps in May 2006. (July 23, 2007)

Capt. John King of Edgewood and Capt. Herb Daniels of Tacoma were among 25 company grade officers and three warrant officers presented last week with the Army's General Douglas MacArthur Leadership Award, recognizing outstanding leadership by junior officers. The winners got a chance to meet President Bush and received a bust of MacArthur and an engraved watch from the Association of the United States Army.

King is with the Washington National Guard; Daniels is with the 1st Special Forces Group at Fort Lewis. (May 21, 2007)

President Bush with Capt. Herb Daniels	The president with Capt. John King

U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Mike Pryor

He's kind of hard to make out but that's Sgt. Jeremy Stockdale of Tacoma on the left, providing security last week in the Sha'ab neighborhood of Baghdad's Adhamiyah District. His battle buddy there is Spc. Justin Hovatter of Spring Lake, N.C. They are serving in Iraq with the 2nd Battalion, 325th Airborne Infantry Regiment, a unit of the 2nd Brigade, 82nd Airborne Division. (5-2-07)

Riley F. McNeal, a Bellarmine Prep graduate from Tacoma who attends the University of Idaho, was to receive a Purple Heart today for wounds he suffered while serving with the Marines in Al Anbar Province. Here's the rest of the story courtesy of the Associated Press:

In January 2005, just a semester short of completing his degree in secondary education, he enlisted in the Marines through the National Call to Service program.

That program allows volunteers to sign up for 15 months active duty service followed by 24 months in the reserves.

“This war is a cause I believe in. I wanted to do my part put in a couple of years,” McNeal said in a press release from the university.

He went to Iraq a year later and was in a platoon responsible for locating improvised explosive devices. During combat operations in the Al Anbar Province, McNeal’s vehicle was struck by an IED.

He received a laceration to the left side of his head, was treated for his injuries and returned to duty.

McNeal was honorably discharged in November 2006. He returned to the University of Idaho, and will complete his degree this semester. He plans to teach high school history.

“This solidifies everything that happened over there,” McNeal said of the medal. “We found roadside bombs and I’m receiving a Purple Heart for a roadside bomb. It was a sacrifice I’m proud of.”

The Purple Heart is awarded to service members wounded by an instrument of
war in the hands of the enemy.

Army Reserve Sgt. 1st Class Jerome "Marco" Jackson of Lakewood is serving in Djibouti with the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa.

Jackson

He's the son of Jerome and Ursula Jackson of Lakewood and a 1990 graduate of Steilacoom High School.

The civil affairs specialist is among the 1,800 U.S. service members working in the region. "My job entails winning the hearts and minds of the local populace by trying to make a difference here," he said, according to a task force press release. (4-26-07)

West Point cadet Elizabeth Betterbed of Fox Island was named to the Patriot League all-academic soccer team and was one of 12 on the list to post a 4.0 or better. Her dad, Tom, also reports that after her first semester Betterbed is the academic No. 1 in her class of 1,238 plebes.

Army Pvt. Kelly M. Kindig graduated basic training at Fort Knox, Ky. He's the son of Mark Kindig of Sumner and is a 2004 graduate of Sumner High School. (2-28-07)

Army Lt. Patrick England of Lakewood is leading a heavy weapons platoon in Afghanistan with an infantry battalion from the 4th Brigade, 10th Mountain Division out of Fort Polk, La. England -- whose dad, George W. England III, is a retired Army officer and a well-known local soccer referee –- reports the LT is doing well. Patrick England (that's him at the right, standing in front of his uparmored Humvee) is a 2004 graduate of Seattle University.

Four local recruits recently completed Air Force and Army basic training. The airmen graduated at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. The soldiers went to boot camp at Fort Jackson, S.C.

Campos	Carolus

• Airman Jeremias L. Campos is the son of Monique Campos of Port Orchard and a 2006 graduate of South Kitsap High School.

• Airman Scott A. Carolus is the son of Sheri Minks of Puyallup and is a 2005 graduate of Puyallup High School.

• Pvt. Bryan M. Cormier is the son of Mark Cormier of Graham and is a 2004 graduate of Bethel High School.

• Pfc. Ryan L. Cheek is the son of Ken and Roberta Cheek of Bonney Lake and is a 2004 graduate of Sumner High School.
(1-8-07)

Five local recruits recently graduated from Army basic training at Fort Jackson, S.C., and Fort Knox, Ky. Graduating at Fort Jackson were:
• Pvt. Genevieve A. Harms, the daughter of Kellie Cook of Tacoma and a 2006 graduate of Spanaway Lake High School.

• Spc. Amanda M. Goldman, the daughter of Rosella Johnson of Spanaway, a 2002 graduate of Cascade Christian High School and a 2006 graduate of the University of Washington Tacoma with a bachelor's degree. She was an honor graduate of basic training.

• Pvt. Casey D. George, the son of Terry George of Bonney Lake and a 2006 graduate of Snohomish High School.

• Pvt. Todd A. Cooney, the son of Susan Fox of Shelton and a 1992 graduate of Gig Harbor High School. Cooney enlisted in the National Guard.

Graduating from Fort Knox was Pvt. Jason L. Medsker, the son of Tina Johnson of Puyallup and a 2005 graduate of a high school program at Pierce College in Puyallup.
(1-2-07)

Senior Chief Petty Officer Linda J. Cline of Tacoma is the Defense Logistics Agency's senior enlisted reservist of the year for 2006. The Navy reservist stationed at Fort Lewis volunteered to go to Iraq and headed up the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Office for six months at Al Asad. According to her award, she saved taxpayers more than $400,000 by finding unused supplies in the stockpiles and sending them to units that needed them. She's pictured here receiving the award from Army Lt. Gen. Robert T. Dail, commander of the Defense Logistics Agency, at a ceremony earlier this month at Fort Belvoir, Va.

Update: Chief Cline this month received the 2007 Department of Defense African American History Month Military Service Award.

Lewis Palazzo, a 27-year-old heavy equipment operator from Tacoma who enlisted in the Army earlier this year, got some ink in the local paper at his new duty station, Fort Carson, Colo. He's a private in the 4th Engineer Battalion, a combat engineer unit that's being stood up for likely deployment in a year, according to the Colorado Springs Gazette. His parents, Aleta and Robert Benedicto of Tacoma, said Palazzo attended St. Patrick School and Wilson High School. As for the prospect of his deployment, his mom said, "I'm trying not to go there in my mind, but I'm so proud of him."

Five local recruits recently graduated from Army basic training – three at Fort Jackson, S.C., one at Fort Knox, Ky., and one at Fort Sill, Okla.

Graduating at Fort Jackson were:

• Army National Guard Pfc. David Sutton, the son of Theodore Sutton of Fort Lewis and a 2006 graduate of Lakes High School.

• Army Pvt. Benjamin J. Orlosky, the son of Robert and Mary An Orlosky of Graham and a 2004 graduate of Bethel High School.

• Army Pvt. Valerie M. Locklear, the daughter of D. Locklear of Tacoma and a 2004 graduate of Clover Park High School.

Graduating from Fort Knox was Army Pvt. Brandon A. Zwang, son of Teri Zwang of Puyallup.

Graduating from Fort Sill was Army Pvt. Samuel J. Rowland, son of Lane Rowland of Gig Harbor.
(12-13-06)

Three local recruits recently completed Air Force basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio.

Wilson	Nunes	Naro

• Airman Madelyn A. Wilson is the daughter of John Wilson of Tacoma and April Wilson of Federal Way. She is a 2006 graduate of Thomas Jefferson High School.

• Airman 1st Class Savannah M. Nunes is the daughter of Michael Nunes of Yelm and Robin Pederson of Gig Harbor. She graduated from Gig Harbor High School in 2005 and received her associates degree this year from Tacoma Community College.

• Airman Dane A. Naro is a 2004 graduate of Rogers High School in Puyallup.
(12-11-06)

U.S. Navy Lt. Kevin Crisson of Tacoma is working as an assistant operations officer at Camp Lemonier in Djibouti, as part of the Combined Joint Task Force Horn of Africa, according to a task force press release. Crisson, pictured here with his mom, Val, is a Bellarmine Prep alum and a 1999 U.S. Naval Academy graduate. His dad is Mark Crisson, the Tacoma Public Utilities director, himself a Navy grad and former submarine sailor. (11-29-06)

Benjamin J. Papale, a 2001 graduate of Bethel Baptist Christian High School in Spanaway, was recently promoted to corporal and decorated with the Marine Corps Achievement Medal. He is serving in Iraq with the 3rd Battalion, 14th Marine Regiment. Papale is the son of Donald and Eileen Papale of Spanaway. (11-28-06)