Oregon
An Oregon veteran’s lost Purple Heart turned up in a safe. It’s now uniting his complicated family
Members of Klamath Falls American Legion Post 8 stumbled over a World War II mystery two months ago after deciding to replace the floor in the 100-year-old building.
First, though, a massive safe had to be emptied and moved. The job fell to Samanthea Totten-Perry, adjutant finance officer, and her husband, Earl Perry, an executive board member.
When the couple swung open the heavy door and rooted through the items, they discovered far in the back a jewelry box. Totten-Perry pulled it out, opened it and saw a Purple Heart. Taped to the inside lid was a handwritten note:
This Purple Heart was found by the YMCA. The owner cannot be located. His name is Dale R. Hoeye. If you know him please contact our commander in order to claim.
For the next few days, Totten-Perry asked post members about the medal. She got nothing but puzzled looks, told the name meant nothing. The only clue, if you could call it that, came from the legion’s oldest member. In the post for 55 years, he said he remembered once seeing it in the safe when he joined the legion.
This was no ordinary trinket.
One of the most honorable military awards, the Purple Heart is given in the name of the president of the United States to a recipient injured or killed in combat.
Totten-Perry did some checking on her own. Her research showed there was no Hoeye living in the area.
In addition to volunteering at the post, she has a full-time job as a construction site manager and is always busy. She could have put the jewelry box back in the safe and been done with it.
But Totten-Perry believed she had a moral obligation to return the Purple Heart to the serviceman’s family. She sat at the computer and logged onto the post’s official Facebook page, seen by American Legion posts across Oregon.
Can you help us? We have the purple heart of Dale Hoeye stored at the American Legion Post 8 for many many years. It was found by the YMCA which was unable to locate the owner or the owner’s family, so they gave it to us (we don’t know when this occurred) – we have no other information than that. Can you help us return this to the rightful owner or next of kin?
The Purple Heart changed hands Friday afternoon at American Legion Post 158 in Tigard.
In addition to revealing the vagaries, injustices and pain of war, it was an moment that hinted at the possibility — long after the battles have ended – of a chance for a family to heal.
This is part of the team that found the family of a Purple Heart recipient from World War II. From left to right: Lisa Clarke, Karen Grange, Ellen Sedell and Samanthea Totten-Perry. Two sleuths, one in Portland, the other in Newport, used genealogical research to trace the sailor’s family tree.
‘WAR IS WAR’
Days after Totten-Perry hit send, Karen Grange, who lives in Tigard, received an email from a southern Oregon American Legion post friend.
The friend had copied the Facebook post and sent it to Grange, a member of the Military Order of the Purple Heart Auxiliary, a member of American Legion Tigard Post 158 and a volunteer at Portland’s Veterans Affairs Medical Center.
During World War II, Grange’s Japanese family was imprisoned in the Minidoka camp in Idaho. She was born there in 1944.
The email regarding the Purple Heart haunted Grange. She decided to look for the next of kin of the man, a choice she believed was the right thing to do.
“War is war,” she said Friday. “Bad things happen to everyone.”
She showed the email to Lisa Clarke, another volunteer at the VA Center. An Air Force veteran, Clarke enjoys doing genealogical research. She got to work.
Unbeknownst to her, Janine Kidd with American Legion Post 116 out of Newport also saw Totten-Perry’s Facebook post. She began her own research and emailed Totten-Perry.
“I don’t want you to think I’ve forgotten — really, just the opposite! I’ve had so much fun (and luck!) researching this family, and I could just keep going.
It is a fascinating family; they are Oregon pioneers, and many, many of the Hoeye family have served in our armed forces. They are (at least) a two-time Gold Star family. I have the utmost respect for their service for our country.
TRACKING THE FAMILY TREE
The sleuths learned that Dale Robert Hoeye was born on Jan. 18, 1925, in Pendleton.
On Jan. 27, 1942, less than two months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, 17-year-old Hoeye enlisted in the Navy. Three months later he was assigned to USS Laffey.
On Nov. 13, 1942, the ship was destroyed in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. The ship had a crew of 245 and 59 died. The ship came to rest at the bottom of Iron Bottom Sound.
Hoeye’s body was not recoverable.
“I don’t know if there was ever a ceremony for Dale,” said Grange. “He gave his life for his country and what did he get? Probably nothing.”
Clarke’s extensive research led her to Ellen Sedell, 79, of Portland. Sedell is part of the complicated Hoeye family and has been researching it for more than 50 years. She has an extensive family tree posted publicly on ancestory.com, which is where Clarke found her.
Clarke left Sedell a message on the site and explained what she was doing. Sedell responded and soon she and Grange connected.
Grange learned that Dale R. Hoeye had a younger brother, Wesley Hoeye, who was 12 when his older brother enlisted.
When he later married, Wesley named his son Dale A. Hoeye in memory of his dead brother. Dale A. Hoeye later had a son named Brian Hoeye.
The dead sailor’s father, Dean R. Hoeye, had three children — two boys and a girl — with his first wife. Following a divorce he later met another woman and started a second family and had three more children.
“We never knew much about the other side of our family,” said Sedell, part of the second family’s side of the tree. “Call it a family schism. We never saw them.”
After talking with Grange, Sedell agreed to take possession of the Purple Heart.
Kidd, the other researcher, found Dale R. Hoeye’s side of the family, tracked down Brian Hoeye – the dead veteran’s great nephew – and passed the information on to the Klamath Falls Legion post.
Totten-Perry called Brian Hoeye, 37, of Oregon City and told him about the medal.
“It seemed insane,” he said. “It just didn’t seem true.”
He agreed to take possession.
How do you split a medal?
Two people who knew nothing about each other, who had never met were about to come together because of a dead man and a Purple Heart found in a safe.
‘IT SHOULD GO TO HIM’
The plan was to have everyone meet Friday afternoon at the Tigard American Legion post.
But then Brian Hoeye had to go to Baker City for work and couldn’t attend. Sedell would accept the Purple Heart from Totten-Perry.
Brian Hoeye said he’d hoped to meet Sedell.
“It would be nice to get to know each other a bit,” he said.
Sedell said at this point Brian Hoeye is “just a name on my ancestry chart. But that will change.
In the coming weeks, she plans to meet this obscure branch on the family tree and give him the Purple Heart.
“It should go to him,” she said. “The man who died is his father’s uncle.”
In the Tigard Legion hall Sedell was adamant.
“Yes,” she said. “It belongs with him.”
— Tom Hallman Jr
503-221-8224; thallman@oregonian.com; @thallmanjr
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HILLSBORO Ore. (KPTV) – Oregon’s 36th annual international air show kicked off Friday night in Hillsboro and hundreds of people showed up for the occasion!
For people who show up every year, including Chris Roman, he said it never gets old.
“You know, it’s like a birthday. It’s not quite the same every year but it’s still fun each and every year. There’s always something different and there’s always different stories you hear about the pilots so it’s a great time,” Roman said.
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The show features the U.S. Air Force F-16 Viper and U.S. Navy F/A-18 Rhino demonstration teams which will both fly heritage flights with the P-51 Val-Halla and F6F Hellcat.
People who attended the event also got to see the F-15 Strike Eagles of the 366th Fighter Wing, the Air Force’s C-17 and KC-135 demonstration teams.
“These guys are acrobats, and they are stunt kings,” Perry Manns said.
Some planes even brought back memories for some, including Teresa Busch.
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“I brought my dad the last year, prior to this passing. He was a World War II vet and Korean war vet, and they treated him like royalty,” Busch said.
Another attendee said seeing the planes up close and personal made him regret his own career decision.
“Oh my God…I should’ve joined the Air Force, instead of the Coast Guard,” Perry Manns laughed.
The 2024 Oregon International Air Show will take the skies from May 17-19 at the Hillsboro Municipal Airport at 3355 NE Cornell Rd., Hillsboro, OR 97124.
Tickets can be found here.
Copyright 2024 KPTV-KPDX. All rights reserved.
An Oregon man has been charged in the murders of three women who were found dead under “suspicious circumstances” last year, officials announced Friday.
Authorities have identified one suspect in the deaths of the three women – Charity Lynn Perry, 24, Bridget Leanne Webster, 31, and Joanna Speaks, 32 – the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office said Friday.
Bridget Leanne Webster, Charity Lynn Perry, and Joanna Speaks.
Multnomah County DA/Clark County Sheriff’s Office
Jesse Lee Calhoun, 39, has been charged with three counts of second-degree murder and three counts of second-degree abuse of a corpse in connection with the women’s deaths, the district attorney’s office said, after a grand jury returned the six-count indictment on Thursday.
At a press briefing Friday, Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt called the case “complex,” and said it required a “significant investigation” involving multiple law enforcement agencies.
“There’s still more work to be done, investigations are ongoing,” Schmidt said.
Calhoun has been in custody at Snake River Correctional Institution since July 2023 for unrelated charges and was scheduled to be released next month, online Oregon Department of Corrections records show. He is expected to be transferred to the custody of Multnomah County authorities for arraignment, prosecutors said. It is unclear if Calhoun has an attorney who can speak on his behalf.
Multnomah County authorities, citing the ongoing investigation, released few details about the case, including what alleged evidence led them to the suspect and how the women died.
Speaks’ body was found at an abandoned property in Ridgefield, Washington, on April 8, 2023, authorities said. Police in Portland, Oregon, said in November 2023 that the homicide was believed to have happened in Portland.
The Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office said in July 2023 that they were investigating whether the deaths of four women – including Perry and Webster – who were found dead throughout Oregon were related. The announcement came weeks after Portland police spoke out against online speculation regarding a possible serial killer in the Pacific Northwest.
This undated photo provided by the Oregon Department of Corrections show Jesse Lee Calhoun, who has been under investigation in the deaths of four women whose bodies were found scattered across northwest Oregon last year.
Oregon Department of Corrections via AP
Perry’s body was found in a culvert near Ainsworth State Park in east Multnomah County on April 24, 2023, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office said. The Polk County Sheriff’s Office in Oregon said Webster’s body was found six days later, on April 30, 2023.
Perry’s mother, Diana Allen, told reporters Friday that it’s been “very, very frustrating” for the families of the victims not to have answers amid the ongoing investigation, but that she has had respect for the district attorney office’s process.
“Even though they wouldn’t give me the answers, I knew they had answers,” she said.
The deaths of two other women – Kristin Smith and Ashley Real, both 22 – initially believed to have been linked, remain under investigation, the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office said Friday.
The body of Smith, who was reported missing in December 2022, was found on Feb. 19, 2023, in a wooded area in Portland, police said. Real’s body was found in a wooded area in Clackamas County in Oregon in May 2023, a month after she was reported missing to Portland police, authorities said.
“We keep waiting, we keep praying and stay hopeful,” Melissa Smith, Kristin Smith’s mother, said during Friday’s press briefing. “We stay hopeful that we soon can get justice for them as well.”
No. 14 Arizona (32-19, 19-9) opened their three game series at Hi Corbett Field against No. 6 Oregon State a game and a half ahead of the Beavers in the race for the final Pac-12 regular season championship.
By the end of Thursday night, that lead dwindled to a half-game as the Beavers(40-12, 18-9) used a five-run third inning to defeat the Wildcats 9-2 in the series opener.
“There was not a facet of the game I thought we did very well at all,” Arizona coach Chip Hale said.
Aiden May, Oregon States starting pitcher, happens to be a familiar face for Arizona. The right hander transferred to Oregon State after spending the previous year with the Wildcats.
May pitched 7 innings, had 7 strikes, allowing 6 hits and 2 runs (1 earned) to improve to 6-0 on the season.
Jackson Kent, Arizona’s starting pitcher, opened the game with a strike out of Oregon States lead-off batter and No.2 draft prospect Travis Bazzana on a 96-mph fastball.
Kent pitched two solid innings before the Beavers opened the dam in the third inning including two 2 RBI homers one by designated hitter Gavin Turley and the other by right fielder Brady Kasper.
“First inning he looked dynamite, 95.. his breaking ball was snapping, just ran into a buzz saw there, they did a great job. Haven’t had many of those starts obviously all year he’s been great.” Said Hale.
Arizona, already skinny in the outfield position, with Easton Breyfogle (hamstring) day-to-day and TJ Adams (shoulder) out indefinitely, lost another one when right fielder Emilio Corona was hit in the hand while up to bat in the second inning.
Corona, in obvious pain, took the field in the third and fourth inning before getting pulled.
“The way it got so swollen so quick, it’s not good,” Hale said about Corona’s hand.
With Corona out, pitcher Casey Hintz may see some time in the outfield in Friday’s game.
Arizona’s first run came in the third inning when Brandon Rogers hit a single to the right side. A fielding error by Oregon State’s right fielder Brady allowed Rogers to show his speed, ending up safe at third base.
Richie Morales’ ground out brought Rogers across the plate.
The Wildcats’ second and final score of the night came in the eight inning. Freshman first baseman Andrew Cain doubled down the first base line and Morales hit into a double play, advanced Cain home.
Arizona, needing one win against Oregon State to secure the Pac-12 regular season championship, will start Clark Candiotti on the mound Friday night.
Game two in the series will start at 6:00 p.m. at Hi Corbett Field.
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