Joe R. Fulghum, Jr.

Joe Raymond Fulghum Jr. was born on 10 September 1939 to Mr. and Mrs. Joe Fulghum in Murfreesboro. He commissioned from Middle Tennessee State College’s Reserve Officer Training Corps on 27 July 1966 as a rotary wing aviator. Fulghum served with the 283rd Medical Detachment as a medevac pilot. He earned the Air Medal among other awards.

On 02 February 1967, Joe R. Fulghum died in Bien Hoa Province (III Corps) South Vietnam while performing a rescue and recovery mission in a UH-1D for the 283rd Medical Detachment. On a volunteer mission to extract wounded from a very hot landing zone, Fulghum's aircraft was flying at approximately 800 feet when it took five rounds of small arms fire to the main rotor and engine area and crashed. The Army had only recently awarded Fulghum the Distinguished Flying Cross for flying his helicopter into fierce fighting five times to retrieve over thirty-seven wounded American soldiers near Lai Khe. 

A memorial scholarship in his name was created in 1967 to award financial aid to cadets at MTSU. Captain Fulghum rests peacefully at Nashville National Cemetery in Madison, Tennessee.