The newly constructed site displays the wreckage of a plane flown by Ensign Joseph Cox from Idaho and will be dedicated on July 27, symbolizing the tremendous sacrifice and loss of human life near this Pacific island during the war.
The Yap Visitors Bureau and the Missing Air Crew Project have been working together for several years to preserve and remember this very special group of soldiers.
In the historical context of the war and the Pacific theatre, American losses near Yap, now part of the Federated States of Micronesia, were substantial yet continue to be overlooked even today.
Strategically located between the Philippines and Guam, Japanese-occupied Yap was targeted almost daily from June 1944 to Aug. 1945 at the cost of hundreds of American men, 110 of which remain classified as missing in action.
Pat Ranfranz from Cameron, Wi., founder of the Missing Air Crew Project has spent over 20 years researching war-time Yap and the stories behind each soldier and his mission, hoping to preserve their memories for generations to come.
His uncle is among the soldiers that remain MIA.
The memorial to be dedicated on July 27 displays the actual wreckage of an F6F-5 Hellcat flown by Ensign Joseph Cox, one of 36 American planes that fell near the island.
Cox’s plane was shot down with three other Hellcats from the USS Enterprise on Sept. 6, 1944 and was only recently recovered moderately intact.
“It is truly one of the most unique wrecks and now memorials in the Pacific,” explains Ranfranz.
“After the war, most of the wreckage throughout the world was picked over and removed. Fortunately in this case, the Yapese have respected the wreckages as grave sites and taken care to preserve them and remember the American men who lost their lives during the war.”
The plane was spared from the expanding Yap landfill in 2008 and relocated to government held land.
Displayed on a concrete pad next to an all-weather sign and memorial marker describing the man, the plane, and the mission, the Yap Visitors Bureau together with the Missing Air Crew Project were able to construct one of the finest memorials to American men lost in the Pacific theatre.
Ranfranz is extremely grateful for the work that has been done to make the memorial come together.
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