Lieutenant William Marshall Roark was killed in action attacking targets in North Vietnam as pilot of a Navy A4C Skyhawk jet. He was flying from the aircraft carrier USS Coral Sea on April 7, 1965, while on his second deployment to the Vietnam conflict. Roark had served as cadet colonel and commanding officer of Central’s ROTC regiment and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1960. For his heroism in combat, he was awarded the Purple Heart and the Distinguished Flying Cross. The destroyer USS Roark was named in his honor in 1967. A plaque on the USS Roark quotes from a letter Lt. Roark sent his wife. “I don’t want my sons to fight a war I should have fought. I wish more Americans felt that way. I will not live in a totalitarian society and I don’t want you to, either. I believe in God and will resist any force that attempts to remove God from society, no matter what the name. This is what the Founding Fathers stood for.”
William passed away in 1965 at the age of 26.