Medal of Honor Scholarship
Presentation at the University of Pennsylvania
“Navy Birthday” Ceremony
October 11, 2006

Mr. Brian M. Thacker presents the AFCEA
Medal of Honor Scholarship to ROTC Midshipman Katie Burkhart,
a senior at the University Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, in October.

Seated on the front row are Lt Gen Nicholas B. Kehoe, USAF (Ret.),
President, Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation, and
Col Glen Wagner, USMC, Commanding Officer, Navy ROTC,

University of Pennsylvania

Medal of Honor recipient Mr. Brian Thacker presented the AFCEA Medal of Honor Scholarship, which is co-sponsored by the Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation and the AFCEA Educational Foundation, to Navy ROTC Midshipman Katie E. Burkhart, a senior at the University of Pennsylvania. 
The presentation was part of the Navy Birthday celebration, observed by members of the Navy ROTC battalion and special guests. 

Midshipman Burkhart received a scholarship award of $3,000, a copy of
Medal of Honor: Portraits of Valor Beyond the Call of Duty, and a Medal of Honor medallion embedded in Lucite.  During the ceremony, a video-brief was shown depicting some of the book’s oral histories and Mr. Thacker spoke to the audience with an inspiring message.

In the spring of 1971, then Army First Lieutenant Thacker was in charge of a six-man team to support South Vietnamese artillery at Fire Base 6.  On the morning of March 31, the North Vietnamese launched a coordinated attack along a sixty-mile front that hit his post and killed three of his men.  Engaged in hand-to-hand combat through most of the day, the team watched helplessly as first one then a second rescue helicopter was shot down.  Lieutenant Thacker, realizing the enemy was preparing for a final assault, gathered his remaining men, including the survivors of the rescue helicopters, and ordered them to withdraw.  Remaining behind to provide covering fire, Lieutenant Thacker called in U.S. artillery fires on his own position.  In the ensuing chaos, Lieutenant Thacker was unable to rejoin his men, and survived for eight days without food or water in the midst of the North Vietnamese.  Finally after the South Vietnamese retook the Fire Base, he crawled back to safety.

Two years later, on October 15, 1973, Lieutenant Thacker received the Medal of Honor from President Richard M. Nixon.