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Cousins search for snapshots of Minnesota vets killed in action

Budd Parker and Tim `Pete` Fairbanks are rebuilding and expanding a White Earth memorial begun around 2005 at White Earth Health Center and seek the public's help finding long-lost photos.
Motivated by gaps from destroyed records, Budd Parker and Tim `Pete` Fairbanks have spent nearly 20 years memorializing veterans, facing challenges from about 97% of OMPFs destroyed in the 1973 St. Louis fire.
Paying out of pocket for military records and hiring a St. Louis researcher, Parker and Fairbanks assemble 16‑by‑20‑inch tributes, with over $1,000 spent on records.
The project will recognize Forty veterans spanning from the Spanish‑American War through Vietnam, include a female veterans wall for 30 women, and recreate damaged memorials removed during clinic remodel and stored.
They are seeking the original Park Rapids Boxing Club 1939 Golden Gloves photo, which was printed in the Star Tribune on Jan. 30, 1939, but the archived copy is too dark to reproduce, and Parker said local historical societies lack memorabilia despite years of searching relatives.

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