(La Porte, IN) - When it comes to patriotism, it’s never too late to remember, or to be remembered.
This week a fallen La Porte County hero was remembered and honored at a ceremony at La Porte City Hall.
On June 19, 1944 Army Private First Class Martin F. Stark of Rolling Prairie made the ultimate sacrifice. He was on a boat in the English Channel heading towards Normandy, when it hit a German mine and sank. On Wednesday his family received Stark’s Purple Heart and other medals from U.S. Congressman Rudy Yakym.
“Martin is someone, who like so many other Americans in World War II, answered the call of service,” Yakym told the crowd. “When the forces of evil were advancing across Europe and pushing their way across the world, it was up to the American soldier to step up and save the world. Martin Stark of La Porte County was one of those soldiers.”
94-year-old Ben Stark was just a teenager when his big brother was killed in action. On Wednesday, after 80 years, he tearfully received his brother’s service medals, including the Purple Heart. One by one, Yakym laid them in Stark’s hands.
Family members read letters that Martin Stark wrote home while he was at war. They contained sentiments one would expect from a 19-year-old— checking in on family, asking about girls back home, bemoaning the Cubs’ disappointing season. His last letter, written a couple of weeks before D-Day, closed with a haunting quote: “A happy shock, a bad period ends. Light after darkness.”
Afterward, Ben recounted his relationship with Martin. “Me and my brother, we fought like cats and dogs,” Stark remembered. “We’d throw tin cans at one another. I got a scar up here from one where he hit me on top of the head.” But Stark said his big brother also protected him. “He was my friend; he was my bodyguard. We sat at night and laid in the ditch and counted the stars.”
Stark, who lives now in Arizona, said he was apprehensive about the government red tape ever being cut through. Yakym’s was the third federal office to take on the project of procuring the medals. About this, the two shared a good-natured exchange. Stark, a lifelong Democrat, quipped that he was very grateful to Yakym, even though the congressman is a Republican.
“When people call my office,” Yakym responded, “we don’t ask if they’re Republican or Democrat; we just go to work for them.” Stark said if he had his way, he’d get rid of both parties, then, jokingly to Yakym, said, “But you might even get my vote if I come back to La Porte.”
Four years ago, Martin Stark’s great niece Barbara Barnett started the process of obtaining his medals after researching her family’s genealogical lines. “I could trace everybody’s,” she said. “And I got really upset because I was looking at everyone’s branches and Uncle Martin’s just stopped. I wanted to get to know him.” That’s when she found out from her Uncle Ben that his brother was never officially honored by the Army.
Barnett felt that it was a chapter in the Stark family that had to be closed before Uncle Ben passed away, before the Greatest Generation is gone. “There were many times I ran into snags,” she said. And when she felt like giving up, her uncle would write a letter reminding her, “Y’know girlie, I’m not getting any younger.”
Barnett says the family never received her uncle’s medals because he was initially declared missing, then his military records were lost in a fire. She relied on local veterans’ advocates, La Porte historian Bruce Johnson, and the public library to help her piece together the documentation needed.
About two dozen family members gathered for Wednesday’s ceremony. Some had not seen each other for a decade or more. Martin’s memory brought them together. A military honor guard saluted him with a volley of rifle fire and the playing of Taps.
Wednesday was also National Purple Heart Day, an occasion not celebrated by too many. For the Stark family, though, there was special cause for celebration. Martin Stark served his country and never came home. But now his medals have, and he is properly remembered.
