Why complete strangers showed up to one homeless veteran’s funeral

KANAWHA COUNTY, WV (WOWK) – A West Virginia hero was laid to rest on Thursday, though his funeral ceremony was nontraditional: everyone who showed up was a stranger.

That’s because when 77-year-old Ronald Tittle died in the Beckley area on March 29, gaps in his life story appeared. Funeral directors said his parents’ names are unknown, though Tittle was born in Kanawha County, and they are not sure if he was ever married. DHHR was the informant of his death.

Tittle was a U.S. Army Specialist who served in Vietnam, and he was a recipient of the Purple Heart award, which is designated for U.S. veterans who were wounded or killed in combat.

“Everybody in this country ought to be thankful. This person put his life on the line, however many years he served, I don’t know,” Gary Parkhill, Chairman of the Board of Directors of West Virginia Patriot Guard Riders said. “That’s unquestionably a hero, so he deserves the honor and respect we are going to give him.”

However, one major part of the end of Tittle’s life is that he was homeless.

“In the great state of West Virginia, and in the great country of the United States of America, we should never, ever have homeless veterans. There is too much money wasted on other frivolous things that should not even be,” Parkhill said.

Another attendee of his ceremony, Toby Haney, the Senior Vice Commander for VFW of West Virginia, said he did not personally know Tittle but was moved to tears by his story.

“We also have a lot of people that struggle with homelessness, struggle with everything going on in a day-to-day life….I’m sure it happens more than we’d like to admit,” Haney said.

However, dozens of strangers, made up of mostly veterans, made it a point to be there for Tittle on Thursday. Specifically, the most compelling part of his story for them is that he had no family who showed up to say their final goodbyes.

“I just know we got a text saying that he had no friends, and we said, that’s not, we can’t let that happen. He’s got plenty of friends here. I wish he knew it,” said Dewey Chaney, President of Vietnam Veterans of America for West Virginia.

Chaney said keeping Tittle’s story alive is important, firstly to attempt to reach any living family members, but secondly because of the profound experiences that Tittle went through: both from serving the U.S. and from living unsheltered in the Mountain State.

“I think it’s important that the nation and the entire country remembers that there’s more to just serving in the military. Some guys come home broken. You don’t have to physically be broken. You can be mentally broken. It’s important to keep veterans and people of our armed forces, even troops who are deployed today, in the public’s eye,” Chaney said.

The ceremony, brief in length, will leave a lasting impact on those who attended.

Mark Gray, a Marine Corps. Vietnam veteran and member of the Vietnam Veterans of America organization, left with a final thought: “A true hero never dies until his name is spoken for the last time.”

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