Paris, Tenn.–At 2 p.m. Sunday, August 4, at Maplewood Cemetery, a memorial tribute will be paid to the late Robert Bennett of Paris who was a ‘smokejumper/firefighter’.
He died at the age of 22 in 1949 in the Mann Gulch Fire in Montana. The national Smokejumpers Association is hosting the tribute and will be honoring all of the young men who died in the accident on the 75th anniversary of the tragedy. Thirteen young men died in the accident and the tragedy prompted changes in the way that forest and wildfires are fought.
Bennett was the son of Robert Guy and Annie Louis Moses Bennett and graduated from Grove High School in 1945. He enlisted in the U.S. Army May 30 and trained as a Medical Technician, was promoted to Staff Sergeant and was stationed at the 29th General Hospital in New Caledonia, an island in the southwest Pacific.
He was discharged a year later and returned to the U.S. Not longer after his return, he enrolled as a student at the University of Montana forestry program. Part of his training was working as a smokejumper–men who parachute into remote areas to provide the initial attack on difficult-to-reach wildfires.
Bennett and his teammates were stationed at Camp Hale in Colorado and they were dispatched to a wildfire north of Helena, Montana in August of 1949, where the tragedy unfolded. A memorial to the 13 smokejumpers who died is at Meriwether Campgrounds.
Sunday’s program will feature placing of a wreath and a bronze memorial marker as well as presentation of a commemorative booklet for the county. Family members will be in attendance and all are welcome.