Oklahoma POW honored with Purple Heart 80 years after service in WWII

An Oklahoma family’s decades-long fight to get their father his military honors is finally over. Nearly 80 years after Elmer “Red” Vanover was released from a prison camp in the Philippines, he was awarded a Purple Heart for his sacrifice and service.

STILLWATER, Okla. (KFOR) – An Oklahoma family’s decades-long fight to get their father his military honors is finally over. Nearly 80 years after Elmer “Red” Vanover was released from a prison camp in the Philippines, he was awarded a Purple Heart for his sacrifice and service.

His son, Tim, said it was a sense of closure for his family.

Vanover made a life in Vinita. First as a farmer, then working for the turnpike.

“When we were growing up, my dad was always there for us,” said Tim.

However, for more than three years in the 1940s, Vanover was a prisoner of war.

"They started retreating down the island of Bataan, and they held off the Japanese army for four months. And finally they run out of everything," said Tim.

Vanover was one of nearly 75,000 POW’s forced to take part in the Bataan Death March during WWII. While a prisoner, he had little water or food, was beaten, and forced to work hard labor.

"(It) had to be tough to live through all that," said Tim.

Vanover was tough. He made it back to Vinita in 1945 after the Japanese surrendered. He spent the next four decades building a life and raising a family.

“When I was a kid growing up, I thought that was the most wonderful place there was,” said Tim, commenting on his home life.

Tim said he did not know much about his father’s time as a prisoner of war until after Vanover passed away in 1990.

“My father didn't like to talk about it much,” said Tim.

After Tim’s mother died, he found his father’s military papers and began to uncover more about his service.

“Then I came across a piece of paper that said that the doctor that examined him after he came back from the Philippines had recommended him for Purple Heart and Combat Infantry Badge,” said Tim.

It was an honor Vanover was never awarded. Tim set out to make it right. He reached out to state representatives, Governors, and even two Presidents.

For 10 years, Tim said he saw little progress until last Veterans Day when Vinita renamed a portion of Route 66 as the Elmer “Red” Vanover Memorial Highway.

“I had the paperwork and everything laying on the table. Representative Rusty Cornwell and his wife and a couple of friends came out and they said that they would see what they could do,” said Tim.

A few days later Senator Markwayne Mullin told Tim he would look into the matter as well.

“It was about a month after that, he called me back and told me that they'd got it,” said Tim.

Tuesday the fight paid off. Tim accepted the Purple Heart in his father’s honor during a ceremony at Oklahoma State University.

“I'm the only one of the kids who didn't get to see him before he died,” said Tim. “It haunted me that I didn't get to that goodbye. But now this is my way of telling my dad goodbye. And I loved you. Enough said.”