But not Caniford. In a sense, nothing had changed for his sisters and their father. Jimmy still hadn't been found. Until he was, there was hope.
Summer 2002
In the summer of 2002, Ken Felty sat at his home computer in Marion, Ind., surfing the Internet for Web sites about American service members missing from the Vietnam War.
After many years avoiding mention of the war, he found himself interested in Vietnam again - especially the fates of Vietnam-era MIAs. (The U.S. government says that of 2,646 Americans missing as of 1973, remains of 885 have been repatriated.)
One MIA in particular haunted him: Jimmy Caniford. On this particular day, Felty came across Caniford's name on a Web site. But for some reason a green logo began to replicate wildly, blanketing the computer screen.
Felty, by then 56 and burlier than in his Vietnam days, managed to find what he assumed was an e-mail prompt for the Webmaster and sent a message explaining the problem.
When he got a reply, the identity of the sender floored him. It was from Jim Caniford, father of his old Air Force colleague. Felty had unwittingly clicked on the spot on the computer screen where the elder Caniford had posted a memorial message about Jimmy.
The coincidence stunned Felty, and terrified him.
For years, Felty had brooded about Jimmy Caniford. Because of the last-minute switch of mission assignments, he'd always felt guilty about Jimmy. That should have been me, a voice in his head told him. Should have been my plane. He had nightmares. He would fall into periodic funks. The moroseness eventually would pass - but it would always return.
Now came a message from Jimmy's father. How would he react if he knew the guy he was communicating with should have been the one to die rather than his son?
Eventually, though, he decided the elder Caniford should know the truth. He began telling his story over the computer and finished it in a phone call that lasted over an hour.
Caniford responded with total absolution. "It's the luck of the draw," he told the younger man.
He relayed his experience from World War II when he was an assistant tank driver in the Philippines. One day, his tank passed a broken-down U.S. tank sitting to the side of the road. Someone, not he, decided to forge ahead. That night Japanese soldiers killed the Americans hunkered in the disabled tank. If his tank had stopped to help, he told Felty, maybe those men would have survived.
