Clayton woman waited 80 years to meet her war hero father

CLAYTON, CA (Dec. 13, 2024) — U.S. Army Ranger First Lt. Jerry Sundstad was killed in Burma on June 5, 1944, when he engaged with Japanese forces in the Battle of Myitkyina. The following month his only child, daughter Dianne, was born in Santa Barbara.

Over the next 80 years Clayton resident Dianne, her mom Dorothy and generations of the family never heard a definitive word as to exactly how Sundstad was killed or, more importantly, where his remains were.

Then on June 24 last summer, a month before Clayton resident Dianne Carbine would celebrate her 80^th birthday on July 25, she received a call that rocked her world. She was told that the DNA she had provided the Army several years ago had been used to positively identify her father’s remains. And on that day a death certificate for First Lt. Herman “Jerry” Sundstad was issued.

On Nov. 8 at Oakland Airport she was on hand as her father’s casket was removed from a Southwest Airlines flight from Omaha. Police and veterans led the casket and family in a touching procession as crowds and merchants saluted the vehicles along the way to Walnut Creek.

At a Walnut Creek mortuary she was able to see and touch her dad, who never got to meet and hold his daughter but intuitively had told his wife to name their child (gender unknown) Dianne Adair to honor a teacher who played a significant role in his education and life.

21-gun salute

On Veterans Day last month at Oakmont Memorial Park in Lafayette with scores of military and veterans on hand along with 60 family and friends, the World War II hero was buried with full military honors next to his grandson Todd Porter. The service included taps and a 21-gun salute.

“It’s been an incredible journey,” says Diane Adair Sundstad Carbine. Just last weekend a Rangers unit from Washington, who served as pallbearers at the funeral, visited her Morgan Territory area home to present her with mementos.

She adds, “I don’t know how to thank the hundreds of people responsible” for the identification and all the resultant memorable aspects of recognizing her father’s ultimate service.

If the name Dianne Adair sounds familiar, it’s because Dianne Carbine used the name her father bestowed on her when she founded Dianne Adair Day Care in 1983. She and husband Larry Carbine retired from the business in 2003. There are currently 16 school sites in the Mt. Diablo and Walnut Creek school districts with Diane Adair Day Care programs run by Larry’s son Brian Carbine.

Her four children (the two older sons are deceased) attended Mt. Diablo Elementary, Pine Hollow Middle School and graduated from Clayton Valley High. Before founding the day care business, Dianne Carbine was a schoolteacher in Antioch and then taught at Los Medanos College.

80,000 war casualties remain unidentified

How this happened is a story that a reported 80,000 American families have never been able to realize as their loved ones who were killed or missing from World War II, Korea and Vietnam as well as earlier conflicts going back to the Civil War have never been identified. Advancements with DNA, genealogical research and anthropological analysis have the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) hopeful of painstakingly identifying 200 of those heroes a year.

Dianne and her children Ben Porter of Boston and Mindi Pemberton of Hawaii plus their combined 11 children now have a gravesite they can visit and quite a few—but not all—of the details of their dad and grandfather’s final days and his whereabouts since that fateful day in 1944.

It turns out First Lt. Sundstad was buried in Burma (twice) with others from Myitkyina, then India and for the past 60 years was in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu as Unknown X-75.

Unbeknownst to his family, in 2021 DPAA disinterred Unknown X-75 from Hawaii and transferred his remains to their lab for scientific analysis. Using dental records, anthropological analysis and circumstantial evidence along with the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System’s DNA analysis they made a confirmed identification.

Grandson Ben took a keen interest in tracking his grandfather’s final days and the location of his remains. Over the past decade he encountered many blind alleys despite his creative research. He was given the wrong Unknown ID number (F-75 instead of X-75) that led the family to an incorrect grave marker.

Born into a farm family

Jerry Sundstad was born in 1917 to a family of Minnesota farmers. His parent had immigrated from Norway. Their farm was far from the small local schoolhouse and during severe winters the school was almost impossible to get to.

Jerry was the only member of his family to go to college and he attributed much of that to his teacher Adair Ash who nurtured her student and at times housed him to be able to get to school. He graduated from Moorhead State Teachers College and taught on Oak Island at the northernmost school in the United States at the time.

He was attending graduate school at the University of Minnesota when he was inducted into the army in April 1941.

President Franklin Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill created an American commando force code-named Operation Galahad. Their mission was to invade Japanese-occupied Burma and reopen the Burma Road to allow supplies into China.

Sundstad was part of infantry reinforcements sent in May 1944 after more than half of the 3000 men from the unit died from disease, malnutrition, fatigue and in combat as they trekked 1000 miles over portions of the Himalaya Mountains.

Decorated war hero

Just days after arriving on Myitkyina, Sundstad was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for “Displaying courage and combat efficiency of a highly commendable nature while in commend of a forward reconnaissance unit.”

The unit had been ordered to secure an objective when “the enemy launched a barrage of heavy mortar and small arms fire…Lt. Sundstad, without regard for personal safety, advanced to reconnoiter positions for heavy machine guns and was forced to expose himself to the enemy. He was mortally wounded by enemy fire.”

Sundstad was awarded the Bronze Star, Purple Heart, Army Good Conduct Medal, American Campaign Medal, European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal and, as part of his unit, the Distinguished Unit Citation. All of those medals are now in the Carbine home.