News Service

11-06-09

ISU Gold Star Hall ceremony honors fallen Korean War soldier from Montgomery County

AMES, Iowa -- A Veterans Day observance at Iowa State University will honor seven former students whose names have been added to the Gold Star Hall, the war memorial in the university's Memorial Union. One was a soldier from Elliott, Sidney Jasper Botts, who died in the Korean War.

Former students are eligible for name-placement in Gold Star Hall if they graduated or attended Iowa State full time for one or more semesters, and died while in military service in a war zone. The university has recently identified several who had not been identified in previous searches. As names become known, they are added to the wall and the soldiers are remembered in the Gold Star Hall Ceremony on Veterans Day.

Iowa State is able to memorialize Botts on Veterans Day thanks to the help of his sister, Mildred Miller, Atlantic, and friend Gale Eschelman, Elliott, who shared their memories.

Botts was born on January 26, 1930, on his family's farm near Elliott. He was the son of Blair and Ethel (who died this year at the age of 99). Botts attended a one-room country school, and graduated from Elliott's small high school. He enrolled at Iowa State in 1947, majoring in animal husbandry. In 1948, he returned home to farm.

Botts married Joanne Wheeler from Red Oak at about the time he was drafted. He entered the service in March 1951 and shipped out for Korea after a Christmas leave. His daughter Pamela was born a few months later, but Botts never saw her. He died Oct. 15, 1952, in an artillery bombardment during the Battle of Triangle Hill. Botts was 22 years old.

Botts is remembered on several memorials, including Fountain Square Park in Red Oak. Now he also will be remembered at Iowa State University, with his name engraved on the wall of the Gold Star Hall in the Memorial Union.

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