A veteran, anonymous in life, is honored in death
Published: Friday, April 01, 2011
By Susan Harrison Wolffis
Muskegon Chronicle
There was no eulogy for Andris Baltaisvilks Friday.
No tears. No funeral luncheon.
No photographs, carefully chronicling his journey from childhood to old age, visual memories of a life now gone.
There was almost no funeral.
When Baltaisvilks died March 15 at the age of 73 at Poppen Hospice Residence in Muskegon, he left behind no next-of-kin, no possessions, no one to make his final arrangements.
But someone at Poppen House — privacy laws don’t allow any more detail than that, said Mary Anne Gorman, Harbor Hospice’s executive director — had taken the time before Baltaisvilks’ passing to talk to him about his life and ask whether he’d ever been in the military.
The answer was yes.
Baltaisvilks, who immigrated to the United States from Latvia with his parents when he was 12 years old, served two years active duty in the U.S. Army from 1961 to 1963. He stayed in the Army Reserves until 1967.
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A veteran, anonymous in life, is honored in death
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