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Medal of Honor recipient Army Master Sgt. John F. Baker Jr.
Episode 2745 of the Vietnam Veteran News Podcast will feature a story about Army Master Sgt. John F. Baker Jr.and his Congressional Medal of Honor award. The featured story comes from The U.S. Department of Defense website and was titled: Medal of Honor Monday: Army Master Sgt. John F. Baker Jr. It was submitted by Katie Lange, the outstanding writer for DOD News.
Lange, in her story, reported that Retired Army Master Sgt. John F. Baker Jr. could have had a prominent gymnastics career, since he competed in high school and trained for the Olympics in his hometown of Moline, Illinois. But after graduation in 1966, he decided to pursue something entirely different: service in the Army and a tour of duty in Vietnam, which earned him the Medal of Honor.
Lange added this about John Baker Jr. Only a few short months after he began his Army training, Baker was shipped off to Vietnam with the 27th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division.
A private first class at the time, 19-year-old Baker said he and his company went out in the jungles for weeks at a time on combat patrols. Often, since he was small guy – only 5 feet 2 inches tall weighing 105 pounds – he was tasked with crawling through Viet Cong tunnels filled with booby traps to try to lure the enemy out of their hiding spots.
Baker had been in Vietnam for only two months, when, on Nov. 5, 1966, he and his company were called to help rescue another unit that had been surrounded by Viet Cong. On the way there they were ambushed, and the man at the front of Baker’s unit was killed instantly.
Listen to episode 2745 and discover more about Army Master Sgt. John F. Baker Jr. and his Congressional Medal of Honor award.
