Donald Wade, 35

• Nickname: Don
• Added: 02-02-2026
• Died: Jul 21st, 1964

• Hometown: Lynn, Massachusetts
• Occupation: Employed at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard at one time.

About Donald: My father and his half-brother were from a broken home. When his mother remarried, she put him and his half-brother in an orphanage. He was 12 years old. His mother had other children with her new husband. My father joined the army when he was 14 years old. I heard that his mother signed papers stating that he was 16; otherwise, he would not have been able to enlist. He was shot while in the service. In the early 1950s, he served in the Korean War. I have a vivid memory of my father from when I was around seven or eight years old, in 1957 or 1958, at Salisbury Beach in Salisbury, Massachusetts, with my mother and father. Suddenly, my father noticed a boy in the water being pulled out to sea by an undertow. Without hesitation, my father jumped into the water, risking his life swimming against the undertow to rescue the boy. I don't recall anyone from the boy's family expressing gratitude to my father, nor, to my knowledge, was any mention of his heroic and brave act published in the newspaper. more... less...