After 56 years, Catherine Campbell had another chance to honor her father, U.S. Air Force Col. William E. Campbell, an F-4 pilot whose plane was shot down and unaccounted for during the Vietnam War. On April 12, Campbell placed a bronze rosette next to her father’s name on the Courts of the Missing at the American Battle Monuments Commission Honolulu Memorial.  

One of ABMC’s three memorials located in the United States, the Honolulu Memorial is located within the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific and honors almost 30,000 Americans missing from the Pacific theater during World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. 

In September 2024, ABMC held a ceremony to place more than 1,000 rosettes at the memorial, but Campbell was unable to attend to place her father’s rosette. However, she and her husband did have plans to travel through Honolulu in April 2025. In coordination with ABMC staff, and local volunteer and fellow Gold Star Daughter Natalie Rauch, Campbell was able to place her father’s rosette during a small ceremony as they stopped in Honolulu.  

Campbell was 17, the oldest of four siblings, when her father’s plane was shot down in 1969. The first sign of her dad was when his Texas A&M Aggie ring was found in Laos and eventually returned to her mother. Campbell’s mother wore the ring until her death in 1995 when her children donated it to his alma mater where it remains displayed as a tribute to the 1952 graduate. His remains were eventually found and identified in 2016. Col. Campbell was buried at Arlington National Cemetery in 2017, along with his wife’s urn. 

When talking about her father, Campbell said she is always amazed at how many people don’t realize there are still so many unaccounted for from the Vietnam War – almost 1,600 service members – so it is important to continue to remember them and those families who continue to wait with hope for news of their loved ones.