Crandall, while recognized for his heroism, will be best remembered for the “warmth of his wit, the depth of his humility and the fierce loyalty he gave to the people and communities he loved,” according to a Congressional Medal of Honor Society release.

Born in February 1933, Olympia, Washington, the All-American athlete had dreams of being drafted by the New York Yankees and earned a scholarship to the University of Washington. That dream was deferred, however, when Crandall was drafted by the U.S. Army in 1953.

Crandall would subsequently receive the nation’s highest honor for valor during the Nov. 14, 1965, Battle of Ia Drang — the first major clash of the Vietnam War, made famous by the book We Were Soldiers Once … and Young: Ia Drang–The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam and the subsequent movie of the same name.

On that day, Crandall led 16 helicopters carrying soldiers into Landing Zone X-Ray in the Ia Drang Valley, but as the fighting intensified, orders came down for follow-on aircraft to abort their mission, meaning all medevac assistance had been cut off to the men of the 1/7 Cav.

“The medevac pilots were all great pilots, but they weren’t allowed to land on a landing zone until it was ‘green’ for a period of five minutes,” meaning it wasn’t being relentlessly attacked, Crandall later recalled.

Crandall recognized that the men he had shuttled into Ia Drang were trapped, in desperate need of ammunition and, for some, medical evacuation.

Contacted on the radio by Col. Ramon Antonio “Tony” Nadal, Crandall recalled that Nadal was yelling, “I got to have — get my wounded out of here. I’ve got 12 guys that are — and they’re collected, and I have a hole where a helicopter can get in, but they won’t come.”

In response, Crandall refueled, kicked off his door gunner and weaponry to lighten his load.

“If you have infantry on the ground, you can’t shoot up their backside,” Crandall said, calling the M60 guns “worthless.”

Ignoring the heavy enemy fire, Crandall, alongside his friend Maj. Ed Freeman, voluntarily flew 22 missions into the valley to deliver ammunition and evacuate some 70 wounded soldiers.

“While medical evacuation was not his mission,” reads his Medal of Honor citation, “he immediately sought volunteers and with complete disregard for his own personal safety, led the two aircraft to Landing Zone X-Ray. Despite the fact that the landing zone was still under relentless enemy fire, Major Crandall landed and proceeded to supervise the loading of seriously wounded soldiers aboard the aircraft.

“Major Crandall’s voluntary decision to land under the most extreme fire instilled in the other pilots the will and spirit to continue to land their own aircraft, and in the ground forces the realization that they would be resupplied and that friendly wounded would be promptly evacuated,” the citation continues. “This greatly enhanced morale and the will to fight at a critical time.”

Crandall would ultimately fly nearly 1,000 combat missions and was further commended for rescuing 12 wounded soldiers during a dense jungle operation in January 1966, according to the Department of Defense.

In 1968, four months into his second tour in Vietnam flying Huey gunships in support of the 1st Cavalry Division, Crandall’s helicopter crashed, breaking the pilot’s back among other severe injuries that left him hospitalized for five months.

The broken back didn’t deter Crandall from flying, but a subsequent stroke in the early 1970s ended his flying career. He retired from the Army in 1977.

Crandall, who initially received the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions at Ia Drang, was awarded the Medal of Honor on Feb. 26, 2007, by President George W. Bush.

With Crandall’s passing there are now only 63 living Medal of Honor recipients.

The 55th and 48th Rescue Squadrons, as well as airmen from the 355th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, all located at the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona, received the awards April 17 and Jan. 17, respectively, according to a service release.

The two rescue squadrons and airmen in the maintenance group were included in the Personnel Recovery Task Force, a 176-member joint team specifically formed to carry out the noncombatant evacuation operation in Afghanistan.

The release stated that the team, which encompassed airmen from 20 different career fields, included pilots, maintainers, intelligence personnel and Special Warfare Airmen who created their own “unconventional recovery network” by initiating their own operations, security and communications in a “rapidly deteriorating deployed environment.”

The team saved thousands of Americans and at-risk Afghans, according to the release, and established a safe evacuation station for over 12,000 refugees between July 16 and Aug. 31, 2021.

Every unit in the task force prepared through exercises, such as the Red Flag-Rescue, to learn how to perform outside usual duties, per the release.

“But during this mission in 2021, our team also led security teams to fortify aircraft and key command and control positions and manned defensive fighting positions along unsecured airfield areas, providing front-line defense that prevented the NATO compound from being overrun,” Air Force 1st Lt. Sebastian Marano, the 355th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron’s interim director of operations, said in the statement.

In total, the task force operated through 864 hours of continuous alert over 53 days, assisting the safe evaluation of 124,000 people, according to the release. The force maintained its alert status until the last U.S. aircraft left Afghanistan.

Another unit said to be crucial to the evacuation was the Combat Search and Rescue forces in the 66th Rescue Squadron, which executed air-to-ground operations, the release says. The 66th officially deactivated before April’s ceremony, so the 55th accepted the award on the unit’s behalf.

The 58th Rescue Squadron was also included in the task force, but it too was deactivated before the ceremony. The 48th accepted the citation on its behalf.

By the end of the operation, individual task force members accounted for one Bronze Star with Valor, 18 Bronze Stars and 151 Air Force Commendation Medals with Combat Devices for bravery and resolve under “extreme hazard.”

“Every couple of years, there’s something that happens that defines the next generation of rescue Airmen,” U.S. Air Force Col. Jose Cabrera, 355th Wing commander, said in the statement.

“Every generation has their time and I think we’re seeing that today — your defining moment,” Cabrera added. “This will go down in Air Force history as one of the greatest accomplishments of the Air Force rescue community.”

U.S. First Army soldiers held a ceremony in honor of Waverly Woodson Jr. on the beach where he came ashore and was wounded, and where hundreds of American soldiers were killed by withering fire in the June 6, 1944, landings in Normandy, northern France.

The Distinguished Service Cross is the second-highest honor that can be bestowed on a member of the U.S. Army and is awarded for extraordinary heroism.

The medal was awarded posthumously to Woodson this month — just ahead of the 80th anniversary of D-Day — following years of lobbying for more recognition of his achievement on that fateful day.

U.S. First Army Maj. Gen. William Ryan gently placed the World War II-era medal on the sand, close to the spot where Woodson is thought to have come ashore on the now-peaceful beach that on D-Day was raked by German machine-gun and artillery rounds before U.S. forces finally captured it and started pushing inland.

The soldiers all saluted, still and quiet under blue skies, when U.S. First Army Command Sgt. Maj. Christopher Prosser gave the order to present arms.

U.S. First Army historian Capt. Kevin Braafladt explained to the soldiers that the next step would be the medal’s presentation to Woodson’s widow, 95-year-old Joann. It will be given to his family in a ceremony later this summer.

“We want to be able to say that this medal came from Omaha Beach and was at the site of Woodson’s actions,” Braafladt said.

The soldiers delicately passed the medal from hand-to-hand, feeling its weight and inspecting it.

The ceremony moved U.S. First Army Staff Sgt. Aaron Williams, who is Black, to tears.

“Understanding my position as an African American and to learn about Cpl. Woodson and everything he experienced here on Omaha and in Normandy is very touching to me, and to be here in the exact spot, it’s just historic,” Williams said. “It’s very, very touching.”

Woodson was just 21 years old when his First Army unit, the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion, took part in the Allied operation that helped precipitate Adolf Hitler’s downfall 11 months later.

Woodson’s battalion, the only African American combat unit on Omaha that day, was responsible for setting up high-flying inflatable balloons to prevent enemy planes from buzzing over the beach and attacking the Allied forces.

At a time when the U.S. military was still segregated by race, about 2,000 African American troops are believed to have taken part in the D-Day invasion.

Woodson died in 2005, at age 83, and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

His son, 66-year-old Stephen Woodson, fought back tears Friday when The Associated Press described the ceremony to him by phone.

“I’ve got chills,” he said. “My father is receiving a lot of attention that is long overdue. It’s almost beyond words for me to describe how important this is for my family.”

Waverly Woodson himself spoke to the AP in 1994 about how his landing craft came under intense fire from German gunners as it approached the beach.

“The tide brought us in, and that’s when the 88s hit us,” he said of the German 88 mm guns. “They were murder. Of our 26 Navy personnel there was only one left. They raked the whole top of the ship and killed all the crew. Then they started with the mortar shells,” Woodson said in the interview.

For the next 30 hours he treated 200 wounded men while under intense small arms and artillery fire before collapsing from his injuries and blood loss, according to accounts of his service. At the time he was awarded the Bronze Star.

Although 1.2 million Black Americans served in the military during World War II, none was among the original recipients of the Medal of Honor awarded in the conflict.

The Army commissioned a study in the early 1990s to analyze whether Black troops had been unjustly overlooked during an era of widespread racism and segregation in the military. Ultimately, seven Black World War II troops were awarded the Medal of Honor in 1997.

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Associated Press writer Rebecca Santana in Washington contributed to this report.

In the back of every veteran’s closet, you’re likely to find some old uniforms, dusty caps, a stack of medical, training, and discharge records… maybe a few ribbons or medals. But these are just a few of the typical things that separated or retired service members keep with them. Other things, they’re stuck with forever.

So we compiled a list of the more non-traditional things that veterans carry for life.

1. An incessant need to roll socks

2. Bad knees

3. The misguided idea that ibuprofen and fresh socks will cure any ailment

4. Tinnitis. ZNNNNNNNNNG.

5. The ability to sleep anywhere

6. The plight of not being able to sleep at all

7. Old combat boots. They’re great for mowing the lawn or a trip to Home Depot.

8. Fear of tape tests

9. Issues with authority figures

10. Back pain

11. T-shirts from strange events and places they don’t remember going

12. A woobie that has seen better days.

13. A swearing problem that is FUBAR

14. A love/hate relationship with acronyms

15. Total disdain for PowerPoint

16. Scars from barracks shenanigans gone awry

17, A few ugly divorces

18. A truck they bought after gaining some sense and selling that Camaro they financed at 27% APR

19. Some weird strip club stories

20. Sleep apnea

21. Bad tattoos that seemed like a really good idea at the time

22. Boxy brown t-shirts that somehow have sweat stains in a different, more gross shade of brown

23. A deeply stained, never-before-washed coffee mug that they tell everyone is “seasoned”