A sailor returns to Clay County, nearly 80 years later

Jan. 11, 2021 — harles Alan Jones never made it back to Clay County.

The 21-year-old was aboard the USS Oklahoma when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and he was among the 429 crewmen who were killed when it capsized.

His remains went unidentified for generations, but his name lived on in his hometown in Harvard.

It lived on in his nephew, born 15 years later. Robert Alan Stett grew up knowing little about his uncle, but he knew where his middle name came from.

“My mom and dad had pictures of him hanging in our house,” he said. “They talked about him a bit, how he’d like to go hunting.”

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