Since 1979, the third Friday in September has been designated as National POW/MIA Recognition Day by Congress. To mark this year’s event, Kenosha County Executive Jim Kreuser will dedicate a POW/MIA Remembrance Chair that will be permanently placed in the Kenosha County Administration Building, 1010  56th Street. 

The public is invited to attend the ceremony which will be held Thursday, September 19, 2019 at 4:00 p.m. on the third floor of the Kenosha County Administration Building.
 
The event flyer can be found here.

According to a Congressional Research Service report on POWs:

  • 130,201 World War II service members were imprisoned; 14,072 them died.
  • 7,140 Korean War service members were imprisoned; 2,701 of them died.
  • 725 Vietnam War service members were imprisoned; 64 of them died.
  • 37 service members were imprisoned during conflicts since 1991, including both Gulf wars; none are still in captivity.

According to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, 83,114 Americans who fought in those wars are still missing, including:

  • 73,515 from World War II (an approximate number due to limited or conflicting data)
  • 7,841 from the Korean War
  • 1,626 from Vietnam
  • 126 from the Cold War
  • 6 from conflicts since 1991

The DPAA said about 75 percent of those missing Americans are somewhere in the Asia-Pacific. More than 41,000 have been presumed lost at sea.

Efforts to find those men, identify them and bring them home are constant. In the past year, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency has accounted for 41 men missing during the Korean War: 10 had been previously buried as unknowns, 26 were from remains turned over by North Korea in the 1990s, one was from a recovery operation, and four were combinations of remains and recovery operations.