By Jill Stephenson
U.S. Army, Oklahoma Army National Guard, KIA September 17, 2008.
In mid May a long time friend came to visit me. She came to visit family and attend a graduation party. We met many years ago while working together in Minnesota. We never talked much about her roots or her family from Oklahoma. Little did we know that years later, I would end up living near where she grew up. Sheryl and I were neighbors so she knew my son before he was killed in action. One of the family members she spent time with during her visit was her cousin Kory Thompson. Sheryl informed me that Kory had lost his son Michael in Iraq in 2008. She wondered if we knew each other. We didn’t, however we discovered that we have mutual friends and were both likely at the Middle East Conflicts Wall in Marseilles, Illinois for an event several years ago. It’s a small world.
Kory served in the Air Force for six years. His father served in the Army and Air Force during WWII and Korea.
Michael Thompson grew up in Kingston, Oklahoma. He graduated high school in 2003. Michael had wanted to be in the military since he was a little boy. The events of September 11th sharpened that pull, so did his best friend’s example. He had joined the Marine Corps a year earlier and was part of the first push into Baghdad. Michael enlisted in the Army in early 2004.
Friends and family called him Mikey. With three Michaels in his class, he became “Mikey T.” His fellow soldiers had another name for him: “EYRE,” his middle name and an Irish family name. His father, Kory, had addressed letters to him that way, in all caps, and it stuck. They also called him “the packhorse” because he was a big man with a kid’s heart, always willing to carry more than his share of the load.
Mikey joined the 1st Infantry Division out of Fort Riley, Kansas, and deployed with them in 2005-06. He left active duty service in early 2007, but soon discovered that civilian work didn’t pay well and he missed the structure and discipline of the Army. A few months later he re-enlisted in the Oklahoma Army National Guard. When he heard the unit out of Lexington, Oklahoma needed infantry guys as open-door machine gunners, he asked his commander for a transfer. He got his wish.
On his second deployment, Thompson was serving as an open-door machine gunner aboard a CH-47 Chinook helicopter, call sign Red River 44, when the helicopter went down near Talil, Iraq. All seven soldiers on board were killed, including two other OK National Guardsmen; SGT. Daniel Eshbaugh and Chief Warrant Officer Brady Rudolf. Also killed were Chief Warrant Officer 2 Corry Edwards, SGT. Anthony Mason, 1st SGT. Julio Ordonez, and 1st LT. Robert Vallejo II.
Mikey was laid to rest at Shay Cemetery in Shay, Oklahoma. A shared memorial for the crew of Red River 44 stands at the Dallas-Fort Worth National Cemetery.
Mikey’s obituary described him as “happiest with a gun or a fishing pole in his hand, never met a stranger, and would give anyone the shirt off his back and the last dollar out of his pocket.”
In 2010, a 17-mile stretch of State Highway 70 was designated as the CPL Michael Thompson Memorial Highway. It runs from the west side of the Roosevelt Bridge through the town of Kingston where Mikey grew up.
Mikey’s father shared that there are still things about the notification day he doesn’t remember. He says you can never be who you were before your child died. Within a year of Mikey’s death, Kory joined the Patriot Guard Riders. Standing in flag lines honoring the fallen for other grieving families helped save him. He did this almost daily, until it grew too painful to continue. Michael’s brother, Tommy, died three years ago at age 46 from a heart attack. Kory’s takeaway is this: “Life is about the dash between the dates. We should make the most of it while we are still here.”
For ten years, Mikey’s friends held an annual memorial swim at Lake Texoma in his honor, raising scholarship funds for his high school. Twelve children have been named after him. The boys have been given his first name, and the girls his middle name, Eyre. For this reason and for the friend he was to many, Mikey lives on and will not be forgotten. •
