As a historian, I have heard it said that a “second death” occurs is when someone is forgotten here on earth. It is thus one of my greatest joys when I get to be part of someone coming back to life, so to speak, when their story is shared.
Of all the stories I was able to unearth in 2025, my favorite story that exemplifies someone ‘coming back to life’ would be the story of the World War I dog tags and how strangers came together half a world apart to find the families that they belonged to. This story was titled “Wyoming Sleuths Help Return WWI Dog Tags Buried In France For A Century” and ran in January.
It started with a French metal detectorist Jean Claude Fonderlick, who had found an old American dog tag in what was once one of the muddiest camps during World War I. Instead of tossing it in a drawer or putting it up for sale on eBay, this treasure hunter wanted to bring it home.
He could have made a few quick bucks but instead, Fonderlick wanted to send it home. This dog tag was just a simple, stamped metal disc and had a unit and number instead of a name. There was nothing special about the metal unless you knew that it symbolized a young soldier, a world away from his home facing death in the mud of France.
Since Fonderlick’s English was poor, it took him awhile to find someone who could help. That someone was an author in Casper, Wyoming who was known to do research. Ron Franscell agreed to do the project because he, too, believes that preventing the second death is a worthy cause.
Talking to Franscell was a treat for me. He is an advocate of history and our soldiers. He told me about how he and his wife would go to the cemetery and read off the names of the veterans buried there so that they would still be remembered. This story conjured up for me an image of a simple wreath being laid on the graves of our soldiers and a thank you to them for their sacrifice.
Fonderlick eventually went on to recover seven dog tags which they were able to reunite with their families. Most of these particular soldiers had survived the war and gone on to have families, many of these descendants who didn’t even realize they had a great-grandfather fighting for them in France.
Their stories came to life and the reason I even heard of the story in the first place was one of “coincidence.” I had interviewed Carla Edwards of Casper for another story of lost belongings being reunited with their family. Edwards is a forensic genealogy and one of her hobbies is reuniting people with their ancestors. She, too, is doing her part in bringing people back to life and donates her time to these recoveries.
What a joy it has been for me to share stories with our readers and do my own small part in preventing the second death for those I feature for at least a few more years. It truly makes you look at history in a different way and gives more meaning to the stories that we share among ourselves. It does more than bring history alive - we are bringing people alive, too.
Wyoming Sleuths Help Return WWI Dog Tags Buried In France For A Century
