Vernon L. 'Dummy' Craft died Nov. 14, 1983 at his retirement home in Florida.  'Dummy' was the nickname that was given to him while in high school at Wise.  He was the usual tackling dummy in football practice.  Following graduation during the deepest of the 'Great Depression' he joined the US Army and served 2 years.  Came back to Wise could only find work as a guard on a prisoner work gang.  Rejoined the Army in 1938 and was posted to the Army Air Force as an aircraft mechanic and firefighter.  Was at Clarke Field in the far east when Japan struck on Dec. 7, 1941.  Eventually retreated into the Bataan Peninusla and suffered the surrender and walked the infamous 'Death March'.  Shipped to Japan on one of their 'Hell Ships' he was a slave laborer in a steel mill in Kokura.  Following the surrender and return to CONUS he stayed in the AAF, his last years at Carswell Air Force Base as a radar operator/gunner on a B-36.  After separation from service he returned home and entered Clinch Valley College.  From there he went to East Tenn. State U in the school of Economics where he excelled.  Posting the highest grade in that school at the time was offered a professorship and retired from there.  His life was cut short by the malnutrition and torture that was enforced on him by his Japanese Captors, as it was many others.  He is survived by 4 brothers, Virgil, William C., Jr, Herman and John P.  At his request his remains were cremated and his ashes intered in the family plot, next to his mother, in the Wise Cemetery.

An added feature of his life.  Kokura was the primary target for the second Atomic Bomb.  10 tenths clould cover forced the drop to be on Nagasaki.   Uncle Dummy was anything but a dummy.   It was my severe misfortune to not know him as well as I should have.  

Posted by his eldest nephew, Curtis Craft, with sincere appreation for what his Uncle Dummy did for his country.