Maj. Dale R. Buis and Master Sgt. Chester M. Ovnand became
the first Americans killed in the American phase of the Vietnam 
War when guerrillas strike a Military Assistance Advisory Group
(MAAG) compound in Bien Hoa, 20 miles northeast of Saigon.

The group had arrived in South Vietnam on November 1, 1955,
to provide military assistance. The organization consisted of
U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps personnel  
who provided advice and assistance to the Ministry of
Defense, Joint General Staff, corps and  the division
commanders, training centers, and province and district
headquarters.

In the first major offensive ordered for U.S. forces in Vietnam,
3,000 troops of the 173rd Airborne Brigade—in conjunction
with 800 Australian soldiers and a Vietnamese airborne unit—
assault a jungle area known as Viet Cong Zone D, 20 miles
northeast of Saigon.

The operation was called off after three days when it failed to
make any major contact with the enemy. One American was
killed and nine Americans and four Australians were wounded.

The State Department assured the American public that the
operation was in accord with Johnson administration policy
on the role of U.S. troops.

On May 11, 1969, Hamburger Hill became the scene of an
intense  and controversial battle during the Vietnam War.

Known to military planners as Hill 937 (its height in meters),
the solitary peak is located in the dense jungles of the A
Shau Valley of Vietnam, about a mile from the border with
Laos.       

 Though the hill had no real tactical significance, taking the
hill was part of Operation Apache Snow, a U.S. military sweep
of the A Shau Valley. 

The purpose of the operation was to cut off North Vietnamese
infiltration from Laos and enemy threats to the cities of Hue
and Da Nang.    

Hamburger Hill the day after the battle, May 21, 1969.

SANDY KOZEL

CARLATA BRADLEY

 
1952

Eugene Curran Kelly (August 23, 1912 – February 2, 1996)

Gene Kelly starred in, choreographed, and, with Stanley Donen,
co-directed some of the most well-regarded musical films of the
1940s and 1950s.

Kelly’s health declined steadily in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

In July 1994, he suffered a stroke and stayed in Ronald Reagan
UCLA Medical Center hospital for seven weeks. In early 1995, he
had another stroke which made him severely disabled. Kelly died
on February 2, 1996.

1949