SILVER CITY...
City to Honor Posthumous Purple Heart to Resident Ceremony to Take Place at Cemetery

Almost 63 years after his death, Dale Stranathan is still alive in the hearts of many in his home town.

The American Legion’s Gordon May Post No. 439 in Silver City will honor Stranathan at 11 a.m. October 23, 2004 at Silver City Cemetery. A memorial marker will be placed next to his mother, Myrtle Stranathan. Dale Stranathan was born in Silver City to C. L. “Roy” and Myrtle Stranathan February 13, 1911. He later moved to Council Bluffs and attended Abraham Lincoln High School, but he returned to Silver City and graduated there.

At the time of his death, Stranathan was a l2-year veteran with the Navy and was a resident of Park Rapids, Minnesota. Stranathan, a chief machinist mate in the Navy during World War II, was officially declared killed in action February 20, 1943.

Barry Hiller, Mills County commander of the American Legion, said the following recounts what happened that led to Stranathan’s death: Dale Stranathan had recently celebrated his 31st birthday and was assigned to the U.S.S. Peary, a Clemson-class Navy destroyer, which was off the coast of Darwin, Australia. On February 19, 1942, the Peary was attacked by Japanese bombers, which sank the destroyer. Only 52 crew members survived the assault.

Today, a 4-inch gun that was salvaged from the Peary’s grave site in the 1950s was restored and displayed for the Northern Territory’s 1992 War Service Memorial Year. The gun is now a memorial and points toward the Peary’s final resting place in the harbor. A memorial plaque lists the names of the ship’s crew who lost their lives. Stranathan’s name is not on the plaque.

James Schoening, post commander of Gordon May Post #439, said he wasn’t aware that Stranathan’s name was not on the memorial. Then again, he added, he didn’t know a memorial to the memory of the crew of the USS Peary existed until it was mentioned.

Hiller said Schoening has come up with the majority of the research on Stranathan that he has received. Schoening said he would begin looking into what it would take in terms of getting Stranathan’s name of the memorial. According to an article in the Glenwood Opinion dated April 30, 1942, Stranathan’s family members were notified by the Naval Department that he was missing in action.

Schoening said at the time of notification that Stranathan was missing, his mother had already passed away and his father had remarried and moved to Glenwood, where he is buried. Stranathan wasn’t officially declared killed in action until February 20, 1943, a year after the Peary was attacked and sunk.

Schoening said he doesn’t know why it took a year for him to be declared killed in action. “There’s a number of reasons why it took so long for him to be declared (KIA),” he said. “Maybe it was standard procedure, or maybe it had to do with the United States not wanting to release certain information about certain ships at that time. “We just don’t know.”

Bonnie Riggins of Council Bluffs accepted her brother’s Purple Heart, awarded posthumously, in May 1944. Schoening said this is the first real ceremony for Stranathan. “For whatever reason, we don’t know, what the family did, but they probably felt there wasn’t the need for a (military burial) marker.” He added that back in the day it was commonplace, because of the lack of a body, not to hold ceremonies or take part in other rituals for a dead soldier.

~ Source: A gracious thank you to the "Daily Nonpariel" and Brien T. Boyce for this article and picture.