Staff Sergeant Victor John Pirker

Early Life

Victor John Pirker was born on June 27, 1940, into the small rural community of Whitepine, Montana. He was the third child born to Albert and Johana Pirker, who immigrated to Montana from Europe. The Pirker children were born and raised on a small cattle ranch.

Victor’s older brother David was five, and his sister Mary Jo was four at the time of his birth. The fourth sibling, Irene, joined the family several years later.

Whitepine

Whitepine was a small farming and ranching community located in Sanders County. Like most families in the area, life was hard, and you made do with what you had. Hunting was an important source of food. As his sister Irene stated, “The cows were to sell, not to eat.”

Pirker attended Whitepine Community School, graduating in the eighth grade. It was around this time that his younger sister, Irene, was born. After eighth grade, students from Whitepine traveled to a nearby community to attend high school.

Thompson Falls High School

Pirker graduated from Thompson Falls High School in Thompson Falls, Montana, in May 1958. He, like many small-town Montana boys, played football, basketball, and ran track. He was also an avid hunter.

According to his sister-in-law Lois, he also knew how to have a good time. Growing up near or in Thompson Falls, the river was the place to gather. Pirker owned a boat and could be found hanging out by the river with his classmates. He also attended community dances and local parties.

After graduating from school, Pirker found work on the Noxon Dam project. The dam was fully operational by 1959, so Pirker moved to Missoula, where he worked in construction before enlisting in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1962.

Home Front

Whitepine, Montana, is located about 14 miles northwest of Thompson Falls, near the border between Idaho and Montana. The Lolo and Kootenai National Forests meet here.

When the Pirker family lived there, the community consisted of a small church, a store, a post office, and a school. The oldest three Pirker children walked two and a half miles to and from elementary school each day.

Today, not much remains in the area. The school the Pirker children attended burned down when Irene was in second grade. The church and cemetery still stand as reminders of the families that worked this land and made it home.

Thompson Falls

The largest community near Whitepine is Thompson Falls. It was, and continues to be, the county seat of Sanders County, with a population of around 1,400 people remaining constant throughout the last 60 years. Throughout Pirker’s upbringing, Thompson Falls was home to at least three timber mills, which provided the majority of the employment opportunities, along with logging and the U.S. National Forest Service.

Thompson Falls was the location of a local movie theater, which still operates. Shopping was done locally as travel to cities was very rare. Visiting larger communities often made news in the weekly newspaper. Outside information was slow to reach these rural communities, and radio and television antennae were only installed in the 1950s. Most news came from neighboring Spokane, Washington.

The Vietnam War received minimal coverage in the local Sanders County newspaper. The primary focus of the coverage revolved around which young men chose to enlist or were later drafted into the conflict.

Military Experience

Victor Pirker enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in April 1962. He trained at Camp Pendleton in California and completed Naval Air Technical Training at the Naval Air Technical Training Center in Memphis, Tennessee. There, he earned the credentials as an Aircraft Cryptographic Systems Technician and completed helicopter school by January 1963.

In February 1963, Pirker was assigned to the Third Marine Aircraft Wing based at the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station in Santa Ana, California. He deployed to Vietnam at the end of the summer of 1964.

Pirker flew in helicopters as a part of the 1st Marine Air Wing. He was assigned to the Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 362. This squadron was responsible for medical transport, resupplying troops, troop airlifts, and recon insertions and extractions. Pirker was directly involved in the day-to-day actions and combat of the U.S. military in Vietnam.

While it is hard to determine exactly which missions Pirker’s team completed, it is likely that he participated in Operation Shufly. In this operation, Marine helicopter units, including  Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 362, provided air support to the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) forces on the ground. Operation Shufly continued until December of 1964.

On this tour, Pirker was shot in the shoulder. He had a picture taken of his bloody shirt and mailed that home to his mother. His sister Irene recalled that his mother was not too pleased to see that image, but was happy to know her son was well enough to write and share the story. Today that bullet is attached to the Purple Heart that Pirker received while serving his country.

In September 1964, Pirker returned home from his first tour in Vietnam.

Following his leave, Pirker returned to El Toro Marine Corps Air Station in Santa Ana, California, for additional training. In July 1965, Pirker was promoted to lance corporal, and his unit deployed to Vietnam for Pirker’s second tour.

Lost at Sea

On November 22, 1965, Pirker, along with three other crew members, flew a mission to bring a group of Marines to Trach Tru. When the helicopter was returning to base, they faced heavy fire from the ground and bad weather, forcing them to fly over the water. The helicopter crew made contact with controllers at Chu Lai Air Base but failed to land. It is believed that they were lost over the South China Sea. The helicopter and the men on board were never recovered.

Commemoration

The Pirker family was gathered at the family home in Whitepine the day before Thanksgiving, including older brother David and his wife Lois, who were visiting from out of town. A Marine knocked on the front door. The family clearly remembered that day as there had been a big snowfall and no one ever used the front door. When Marine Major A.C. Ledbetter walked through the unshoveled front yard to knock on their front door, they knew that it would be bad news. Major Ledbetter shared that Victor and the rest of his crew were declared Missing in Action.

Pirker’s younger sister, Irene, remembered waiting and expecting news about her brother any day. She never imagined that questions would remain decades later. Victor’s brother David served in the U.S. Air Force and trained other airmen to survive if they were captured as a Prisoner of War (POW). This made the news of his brother even more difficult to bear. The family hoped that when the list of POWs was released, he would be on it. Irene and her parents were adamant that his name would be on that list. Unfortunately, that was not the case.

The news of Pirker’s disappearance was reported in the local newspaper on December 2, 1965.

Memorialization

Victor John Pirker is honored at the Honolulu Memorial at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, and on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., on panel 3E, line 108.

Locally, he is remembered through the Veterans Memorial in Helena, Montana, the Thompson Falls Veterans Memorial, and with a memorial marker in the Whitepine Cemetery in Whitepine, Montana.

Victor Pirker was posthumously promoted to staff sergeant and received the Navy Commendation Medal.

The Veterans Memorial in Thompson Falls was dedicated on Memorial Day in 2009. Irene remembered the beautiful blue sky with a downpour and no clouds in sight. The rain stopped, and the sun continued to shine. On May 29, 2011, the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post in Trout Creek, Montana, was created and named the Victor J. Pirker Post.

In early 2020, an MIA/KIA bracelet engraved with Victor Pirker’s name was mailed to the elementary school in Trout Creek, Montana. The school had a ceremony to honor Pirker.

While many other local service members from Sanders County served in Vietnam, Victor Pirker is the only known servicemember whose remains were not recovered.

His community and family carry his stories and his legacy with them.

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