Patrick Ranfranz started searching for his uncle’s remains back in the 1980s. He had grown up hearing of how he had gone missing over Yap Island in the Pacific with the rest of the crew on the B-24 piloted by Lt. Gerald Coleman during WWII.
“When we finally went to Yap, my wife and I originally, 20-some years ago, to start looking for my uncle’s plane, I stumbled upon numerous other American crash sites throughout Yap Island,” he said.
After extensive research and multiple trips back to the Pacific Islands, Ranfranz and his Missing Air Crew Project has placed markers and memorials at multiple identified crash sites on the island, which has less than 40 square miles of land.
This past year, they were able to identify and return three soldiers, including Edgar Norcross of Manchester, a private first class in the U.S. Marine Corps.
More than 80 years after his death, Norcross will be laid to rest at the New Hampshire State Veterans Cemetery in Boscawen on Tuesday. A special military flyover by a TBM Avenger single-engine bomber is scheduled to honor his service and sacrifice. Norcoss was flying in one of those planes when it crashed.
Although the remains of his uncle, Sgt. John R. McCullough, have not been found, Ranfranz and his wife, Cherie, have made it their mission to find and document every American aircraft and crew lost over Yap Island and connect with families of the missing.
Using military records, family photos and assistance from the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Agency, the Ranfranzs began identifying crash sites and lost crews on the island of Yap, where over 100 men never returned from their missions.
“There’s a lot of people who still have information I get every week from families of others that send me information that I did not know, or pictures when they travel to Yap,” he said.
On March 16th, 1945, the TBM Avenger Norcross was in had completed its bombing run. It took enemy fire and was seen falling out of the sky after losing all or part of its left wing. No parachutes deployed from the plane, and all three crewmen were declared missing in action.
Yapese islanders initially buried the men near the crash site, though only two bodies have since been located. After the war, they were moved to the American Cemetery in the Philippines.
As technology has become more readily available, some of those interred have been able to be identified through DNA technology, as was the case with Norcross. Now, after 80 years missing in action, he is coming home.
“It’s a huge, immense satisfaction, it’s hard to even describe,” said Ranfranz, who works full time as the vice president of Global Marketing for Rice Lake Weighing Systems in Wisconsin. “A lot of my evenings and weekends are spent doing research.”
Identifying servicemen like Norcross is what Ranfranz’s mission has been all about.
“I think this is so cool that he is home now, and will be finally buried in his home state,” he said. Though Norcross’ immediate family will never know exactly what happened in the minutes before the crash, “this closure now for the family is still huge,” Ranfranz said.
Edgar Norcross’ funeral will take place at the New Hampshire State Veterans Cemetery in Boscawen on Tuesday at 11:00 a.m. A military flyover will be held featuring a TBM Avenger torpedo bomber.