Weston County remembers — Robert Leroy Shuck and Steven Boal’s names etched on The Moving Wall

The Moving Wall, a half-size replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., is coming to Newcastle Aug. 13-17. The memorial honors more than 58,000 men and eight women who lost their lives or remain missing in action during the Vietnam War. The Moving Wall consists of 74 separate panels and has traveled throughout the United States since 1984. It has allowed generations of families and friends to see and touch the names of loved ones who might never have the opportunity to visit the full-scale memorial in Washington, D.C. 

Many servicemen and women were scarred by their experiences during the Vietnam War. Some came home missing limbs. Some suffered from PTSD. Some did not receive a warm welcome home. More than 58,000 never returned, leaving families and friends to mourn their loss.
Although hundreds of Weston County residents served during the Vietnam era, only two local servicemen lost their lives in the conflict. Their names are permanently inscribed on The Moving Wall.

Robert Leroy Shuck

On Panel 12 E, line 8 is Weston County’s first casualty, Spc. 4th Class Robert Leroy Shuck was serving with B Company, 5th Battalion, 7th Cavalry, in the 1st Cavalry Division as a demolition specialist. He entered the U. S. Army in October 1965 and began his tour on August 2, 1966. Shuck was killed by hostile automatic small arms fire, location Dam Trao Lake 16 km SE of Bong Son, South Vietnam, on Nov. 1, 1966, two days prior to his 21st birthday.

Shuck was born in Hot Springs, South Dakota, on Nov. 3, 1945, to Leonard and Jeanne Shuck, along with two younger siblings, Sharon and John. 

Sharon Shuck Smith was two years younger than Robert and spoke about her memories.

“We all three grew up together south of town about 20 miles on a ranch. As a kid, Bob liked to be with the adults. Bob thought he was grown up, so he always hung around the men,” she said.

Smith shared that she and Bob handled most of the ranch chores since their younger brother was smaller in stature and had difficulty with these tasks until later when he hit his growth spurt.

“Bob was kind of like a protector and he was very much a gentleman. We were all in 4-H. Bob was a livestock judger. We had sheep and fat steers. He also did leathercraft in 4-H,” she said.   

He attended school in Newcastle and graduated from Newcastle High School in 1964. Shuck was active in Future Farmers of America and received his Wyoming State Farmer degree. 

Classmate Tom Wright remembers him as a good friend and an all-around good guy. Wright recalls that, in about the eighth grade, Shuck never brought a lunch to school. Instead, he would walk to a downtown café and buy a hamburger, chips and a cup of coffee for 99 cents.

“He really liked coffee,” Wright said.

Wright and Shuck belonged to the FFA Saddle and Sirloin Chapter in high school and went on several Ag trips and he recalls that Shuck was fun to be around. 

“He kind of had a nice sense of humor and he would ‘raz’ you a little”, he said.

Wayne Christensen is another classmate who also remembers going on several FFA trips with Shuck. He said they also spent a lot of time at each other’s homes. 

“We were good friends. I remember we skipped school and went fishing together. We’d have my grandpa write us a note saying we were moving cows, and we’d move cows and then go fishing, or Bob’s dad would write us a note saying we were moving sheep. We’d move the sheep and then go fishing,” he said.

Wally Cash lived and worked at the MW Ranch which was just across the road from the Shuck Ranch, so he rode the school bus with Shuck, and they also put up hay together.

“He used to help me put up hay. We did that for a few years until he went into the service. Bobby and I could put up 800 small square bales a day. I remember Bobby and his sister were good dancers,” he said.

Cash recalls being at a going away party where they had a few beers for Shuck before he left for service.

“We could buy a case of beer for a dollar and a half back in those days,” he said. 

Cash served as a casket bearer at Shuck’s funeral.     

Chris Beardsley shared a few of her memories.

“Bob was a really nice guy. I was really good friends with his family. His sister, Sharry, and I were in the same graduating class,” she said. 

“I was living in Nebraska when he was killed, and I came back to Newcastle for his funeral.” 

Smith said her brother was working for the U.S. Forest Service over by Custer for about three months before he got drafted and that had Bob survived the war, his goal likely would have been to stay on the ranch.

Smith remembers that her brother trained at Fort Carson, Colorado, and he went by ship to Vietnam.

“I remember my grandad telling him (Bob) if he got seasick to go to the middle of the ship,” she said.

Smith remembers him coming home for a few days before being sent to Vietnam and said her mother had a strong feeling that he would not return home.

“He got to come home for a weekend or three days. My mom just knew he wasn’t coming home; she didn’t tell him that,” she continued. “We had lost a family member in each of the wars.” 

Smith recalls being at Chadron State College and that her brother John was in Casper College when they learned of their brother’s death.

“My mother was having a 4-H leathercraft meeting — she was a leader. There were kids and a couple adults there and this guy came to the door with white gloves on and that guy stayed with our family throughout the whole thing. He had a motel in town,” she said.

Smith said Bob and his unit were assigned to blow up a bridge, and she said the enemy forces found out and were waiting for them and 52 men lost their lives that day. The family waited for news when his body would arrive and were told the plane had to be full before being shipped home.

“The plane filled up really fast. I was back in school in 10 days. His body was flown into Cheyenne, and they brought it in by train (to Newcastle). There were two military guys that were with the body,” she said.

Smith said her mother was concerned that her brother’s body wasn’t all intact but received assurance otherwise.

“One of the guys who came with the body said he was shot in the chest, so his death was pretty instant,” she said. 

Shuck’s funeral was held at the Methodist Church and Smith said many family, friends and dignitaries (local legislators) were there. Graveside military rites were performed by the National Guard and VFW Post 2516 at Greenwood Cemetery in Newcastle, where Shuck is buried.

“It was really neat when we were following the hearse. At each corner, the policemen stood out of their car, with the lights on, and there was a salute,” she said.

“His death was very traumatic for my family. I think the funeral was on a Friday and John and I left on Sunday to go back to college. So, for us, it was out of sight, out of mind a little bit. For my parents, it was on their minds constantly,” she said.

Shuck’s medals and his flag are displayed at the Wyoming Veterans Memorial Museum in Casper, Wyoming.

“They contacted us and wanted his life story, so my brother and I decided to donate these items to the museum. It is climate controlled and we thought it was better than having them in our closet,” Smith said.

She has visited the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C., and she was able to take her father to a traveling wall in Sheridan before he passed away, she said.

Three years ago, the Shuck family was honored as a Gold Star family in a ceremony at the VFW in Newcastle and presented with a flag. 

Nearly six decades have passed since Shuck’s death and his family still wonders what could have been had he lived a longer life.  

“My younger brother, John, recently passed away and we were just looking at photos and talking about this. With Bob, he wasn’t married. Who would he have married? Would he have kids? We missed all of that part of his life because he didn’t get to live it.”  

Steven Boal

On Panel W17, Line 111 is Weston County’s second Vietnam casualty, 1st Lt. Steven Boal of Upton, Wyoming. Boal served in A Company, 2nd Battalion, 12th Infantry, 25th Infantry Division as an infantry unit commander. He was killed in action in Vietnam on Oct. 24, 1969, in the Binh Duong Province, South Vietnam. Boal and his twin sister, Susan, were born June 23, 1945, at Salina, Kansas, to LaVerne and Ellen Boal. He attended schools in Upton and graduated in 1963. He was a member of the Wyoming National Guard from September 1962 to Sept. 9, 1964. He graduated fromthe University of Wyoming in 1968 and received an ROTC commission as a second lieutenant at that time. He attended Basic Infantry Officers Course at Fort Benning, Georgia, and was a graduate of the Rangers school. He met Toni Whelan during his college years in Laramie, and they were married in August 1967.

Boal was promoted to first lieutenant before leaving for Vietnam in July 1969.

Boal’s twin sister, Susan Boal Thormann, said he was the older twin.

“Stevie and I were inseparable playmates for more than the first quarter of his life. My strongest memories, and the ones I hold close to my heart, were from our formative years. On our first day of school, he and I walked to the school building, while Buster, (our) dog and constant companion, crawled along on his stomach on the parallel dirt road, heading the same way we were, while we yelled, ‘Go home, Buster,’” she said.

In adolescence, Thormann said, the two continued building bonds on trips to visit their grandfather in Sundance and spending time in the Wyoming Black Hills.

“I always saw Steven as a kind of cinematic director, staging an idea about an adventure he had – mise-en-scenes in the wooded forests, telling me just how I should stand.” 

Thormann said that her brother was a kind and concerned friend to friends and family. 

“He had an abiding love of the past. He was drawn to nonfiction, read avidly and felt a kinship with American heroes.”    

Sally Chirinos, younger sister by 11 years to her twin siblings, remembers how kind, thoughtful and even-tempered her brother was and how much fun they had together.

When he was little, she said, he kept asking their mom and dad for a sword. 

“He wanted a cavalry sword. Our dad was a navigator in World War II,” she said.

A special memory Chirinos shared was how her brother would spend time outside with her, sitting on the lawn teaching her to see things and watch for shapes in the clouds.

“We spent time camping in the Big Horn Mountains. We had a cabin, up from Meadowlark Lake, along with the Materi and Nelson families. Both Steven and Susan liked boating and water skiing. It was the best of times,” she said.

Classmate Doug Addington met Boal when he moved to Upton in the sixth grade and said they didn’t like each other much at first.

“He was always aggravating me. He jumped on my back and I flipped him over. I caught him and let him down easy. He went all the way to the ground. I was a little bigger than he was. That’s when we became friends.” 

Addington said that what Boal lacked in size, he made up for in ferociousness.

“He was pretty driven and focused,” he said. 

The duo spent a lot of time together and became good friends. Boal liked coming out to the ranch where Addington lived, and they spent time hunting and riding motorcycles.

Boal played sports and was in various other activities while attending Upton High School. He was football captain during his senior year.   

“He really liked football. He enjoyed being in chorus. Susan was big in art. I saw him as a leader. He was in speech and debate. Jim Todd, Steve Boal and I were all active in speech and debate.”   

Addington said they spent a lot of time together talking about history and philosophy.

“He was enamored with the armed forces. Both of us talked about parachuters and special forces. That was his goal to be airborne and focus on special forces,” he said.

Addington attended the University of Wyoming and received his draft notice during the first semester of his junior year there.

“We both were Army officers. I was signal corps. He was infantry. I went through Signal OCS and was sent to Germany. He got commissioned after I did,” he said.

Reflecting back on their many conversations, Addington said those talks were relatively deep for a couple of kids back then and he shared another observation about Boal.

“His whole persona was heroic,” he said.           

Chirinos said her brother loved history.        

“Steven was a big history buff. If you were on a road trip, he would stop at every historical site,” she said, recalling how they visited Fort Laramie over by Guernsey and that he locked her in the jail during that visit. 

Chirinos also remembers being 13 and answering the door when two uniformed men delivered the letter to their home announcing her brother’s death.

“I wasn’t nice to them and I do regret that,” she said.

As far as details of his death, Chirinos said he was leading his men in the Ho Bo near Cu Chi, which, she said, is where the tunnels were.

“A couple of his men were hit, and he went to administer first aid and he was hit. I miss him. He was my hero. He was my knight in shining armor,” Chirinos said.