While young schoolchildren are awarded a “gold star” for their achievements, a more poignant “gold star” holds a hallowed place on banners marking the loss and sacrifice of soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen in service to our country. Since America’s entry into World War I, over 1,800 sons and daughters from Marion County/Indianapolis have been memorialized with a Gold Star on their family’s service banner.
In the early days following the declaration of war on Germany by the United States in April 1917, recruiting offices distributed “great posters to be hung from the windows of the homes” of those men who had entered service showing the American Flag and carrying the words across the bottom, “A Son of This Home is Defending This Flag For You.” The month following America’s entry into the war, Indianapolis native Captain Robert L. Queisser, who at the time was residing in Cleveland, Ohio, proposed designating the homes “from which men had gone into military service” with a flag consisting of a red border and white field, upon which “should be placed blue stars or a blue star, one star for every member of the family who is called to the colors.” The Blue Star Service Flag was approved by the War Department as a “Badge of Honor” and was soon being placed in windows and flown from businesses. Tragically, in war lives are lost and to show a family’s sacrifice the Blue Star on a service banner was replaced by a Gold Star.
According to the Indiana Gold Star Honor Roll, Corporal Ralph R. Flora, Company L, 28th Infantry, 1st Division, was the first soldier from Indianapolis to be killed in France. He died in action on March 8, 1918, in the Toul Sector. A telegram arrived at the home of Elias and Rebecca Flora, 1616 E. Washington St, informing them of their son’s death. Elias Flora said, “I have other sons who no doubt will see service soon, and I am glad that it is so” and Rebecca Flora said, “It was something to be expected…I am proud to have given a son in service of his country, and two of my other sons are expecting soon to see service against the German forces.”
Twenty-three years later, Amelia South, a widow living at 3437 Guilford Ave., became the first Indianapolis Gold Star Mother of World War II when she received a message in the early morning hours of December 10, 1941, that her son Private Elmer W. South, 13th Air Base Squadron, Army Air Force, had been killed in the defense of his country at Hickam Field during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Sadly, the war would see over one thousand Gold Stars affixed to the service banners displayed in the windows of Indianapolis homes.
A photo spread in the November 20, 1944, issue of Life Magazine, “Families Speak for Their War Dead,” featured eight Indianapolis Gold Star families from the suburb of Irvington who all expressed harsh words for the post-war reconstruction of Germany and Japan. Louis W. and Olma Buck, 52 S. Audubon Rd., lost their son, First Lieutenant Louis William Buck, Jr, 8th Field Artillery, when he was killed in France on July 22, 1944. World War I Captain John Paul Ragsdale, Sr and his wife Mary Ragsdale, 345 N. Ritter Ave., displayed two Gold Stars on their window service banner for the loss of their sons, Second Lieutenant John Paul Ragsdale, Jr, a navigator on a B-17 Flying Fortress that went down during a raid over Germany on May 21, 1943, and Sergeant Edward M. Ragsdale, a radio gunner on a B-17 Flying Fortress, who was killed on June 14, 1944, while on maneuvers near Salina, Kansas when his parachute failed to open after bailing out of his plane when it developed engine trouble. Irene Burgess, 804 N. Audubon Rd., was also a double Gold Star holder. Her husband, Lieutenant Colonel Milo David Burgess, Inspector General, 4th Armored Division, died on August 20, 1943, in his quarters at Camp Bowie, Texas, and less than two months later her son, First Lieutenant Bruce Burgess, a P-40 Warhawk pilot with the American Flying Circus, Army Air Force, was killed in action over Italy on October 14, 1943. Gold Star mother Bertha Courtney, 63 N. Irvington Ave., lost her son, Master Sergeant Harold J. Courtney, an army bombsight specialist, who was killed July 16, 1942, near Shreveport, Louisiana during a training exercise when the medium bomber he was on crashed and burned. Henry E. and Grace Morgan, 76 Whittier Pl., became Gold Star parents when their son, Private Murray Warren Morgan, Army Infantry, died on May 7, 1943, of wounds received as a result of actions in North Africa. Jeanette McPheeters, 46 S. Ritter Ave., lost her husband, Lieutenant Colonel John Williams McPheeters, 1st Armored Division, when he died on March 25, 1944, of wounds received while directing an artillery barrage on the Italian beachhead at Anzio. Frances Virt Schulz, 385 S. Audubon Rd., lost her husband, Electricians Mate 2nd class Ronald Herman Schulz, 29th Naval Construction Battalion (Seabees), died February 6, 1944, in southern England from injuries received in an accident. He also left behind a young son. Samuel and Eva Ottenbacher, 120 S. Emerson Ave., lost their son, Radioman 3rd class Samuel Ottenbacher, 23rd Patrol Squadron, United States Navy Air Corps, on the night of November 12, 1942 when he went missing after the PBY-5A Catalina on which he was a crew member crashed at sea while on routine patrol north of Oahu, Hawaii.
Another Indianapolis Gold Star was my wife’s uncle, Sergeant Donald Commodore Byers. A top turret gunner on a B-17 Flying Fortress, Sgt. Byers was on his second mission when he was killed August 24, 1944, when his plane was lost over Weimar, Germany due to fighter action.
The constellation of Marion County/Indianapolis Gold Stars sadly continued to expand with 171 casualties of the Korean War and 216 casualties of the Vietnam War. When Joseph and Catherine Frantz, 750 N. Ketcham St., in Haughville opened a telegram from the Department of Defense on the afternoon on August 14, 1950, they learned that their son, Private George Arthur Frankz, 21st Infantry Regiment, 24th Division, was missing in action on July 11, 1950. Fifteen years later, Raymond and Edythe Smith of Spencer, Indiana, formerly of 318 N. Mount St., Indianapolis, were notified of the death of their son, Marine Private First-Class Ivan Ray Smith, who died of a chest wound on May 12, 1965, that he had received the previous day from a sniper while he was on patrol near Chu Lai, Vietnam. These servicemen were the first from Indianapolis to be killed in these conflicts.
Lieutenant General Timothy J. Maude was the first Indianapolis native killed in what would become the Global War on Terror. He lost his life on September 11, 2001, when hijacked American Airline Flight 77 slammed into the Pentagon. The war would add four more Gold Stars to the Marion County/Indianapolis Banner of Honor.
In May 2021, the Indiana Gold Star Families Memorial Monument was dedicated in Indianapolis on the north end of the American Legion Mall. It “honors, recognizes, and serves Gold Star Families and the legacy of their Loved Ones who have paid the ultimate sacrifice for their service in the Armed Forces of the United States of America.”
