LUCAS — Every time Ed Namenyi drove past his neighbor’s home, he couldn’t help but notice the issues with the roof. Shingles were blowing off. Part of it was starting to sink in.
“Nothing was being done about it,” said Namenyi, co-owner of EDN Roofing.
Namenyi stopped in and began talking with the owner of the home, Tillman Franklin Jr. The disabled Navy Veteran told Namenyi he couldn’t afford the necessary repairs.
After hearing more about Franklin’s military service, Namenyi and his business partner Nate Warmath decided to replace the roof for free. EDN completed the work Tuesday afternoon, using materials donated by Modern Builders Supply.
Franklin called it the gracious hand of God. Warmath said it was a blessing to serve a fellow veteran. He said the EDN Roofing often extends discounts to veterans and tries to do one complimentary roof a year.
“I believe a lot of veterans need more help,” said Warmath. “We need more people to help out people.”
Warmath knows first-hand the challenges veterans face once they return home. After graduating from Lexington High School in 2001, he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. He served four deployments, including one in Iraq during Operation Enduring Freedom.
Warmath medically retired in 2017 after tearing his bicep in Jordan. He retired as a corporal in the Marines and tech sergeant in the Air Force.
“I wish I could do a roof a month for veteran and get their story out,” he said.
The making of a hero
Tillman Franklin may be retired, but he never really left the military. He carries his experiences as a Navy medic with him decades after serving in the Vietnam War.
Even as he stands in front of his home in Lucas, sun trickling down through a red and golden autumn canopy, the shadows follow him.
“The thing with post traumatic stress disorder is you’re always in the drama of the action,” Franklin said. “I live in a bunker out here. Ain’t nothin around here but me.”
Franklin’s life changed forever when he stepped on a booby trap in the Vietnamese jungle in August 1967. Since then, he’s lived with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
The nightmares and feeling that danger could be lurking around every corner never completely went away. He also deals with physical ailments related to his time in the military.
Even so, Tillman looks back on his 75 years and described himself as blessed. He remembers his fallen comrades and says he’s grateful to be alive.
“I’m a living, walking, talking miracle,” he said. “God is watching over us.”
From bootcamp to battle
At 17, Franklin was a smart but troubled kid.
“I always had a pretty good aptitude for getting my lessons, but I was hanging out with the wrong guys and skipping school,” he said.
Franklin admits now he didn’t join the Navy out of a sense of duty or patriotism. Instead, it was a quick-witted maneuver to avoid being sent to an alternative school.
“I knew kids that had gone (to the school), and they came back a lot worse than they were,” he said.
After administrators at Mansfield Senior High suggested a “reform school,” he told them about a conversation he’d had with a military recruiter. Franklin said his father cried, but signed the papers allowing his son to enlist at just 17 years old.
Despite never graduating high school, Franklin was assigned to medical training after finishing boot camp. He wasn’t happy about the prospect of more schooling.
He’d hoped to be placed on a ship, but the officer in charge of classifications had other plans.
“He said, ‘the Navy needs corpsman. The test you took to get into the Navy let us know that you can handle that school,” Franklin recalled.
“To this day I haven’t been on a ship.”
Even before setting foot in Vietnam, Franklin saw the horrors of war as a medical student.
“I went to naval hospital in Philadelphia, which was largest amputee center for Vietnam at the time,” he said. “We had 300 or 400 guys in there from the booby traps and the land mines.”
“I seen a lot of tough, horrible stuff before I went over there. That was my training.”
After working in the Philadelphia hospital, he was sent to a field medical school in California. He knew his next assignment would be active duty.
“I should have been sitting at Senior High, but here I was, on my way to Vietnam,” he said.
Franklin arrived in Vietnam in May 1967 with an infantry Marine division. One day, he and his unit were on patrol, hiking through a narrow trail in the jungle, when Franklin stepped on a grenade.
“I got blown up,” he said, raising his hands near the top of his head.
“My legs were broke. My feet were broke. I would have been dead except for my medical kit on my left side. It took the blast that would have taken my inner set of guts out.”
‘I would do it all over again’
Looking back, Franklin calls it a miracle that he survived that day. The Marines he was stationed with put tourniquets on his legs, rolled him up in a set of ponchos and carried him on their shoulders out of the jungle.
Franklin was medically evacuated to Guam, where he stayed in a naval hospital for 79 days. Once he was stable enough to travel, he was taken to the National Naval Center in Bethesda, Maryland.
He later received a Purple Heart and was invited to a National Veterans of Foreign Wars banquet, where he was a guest of honor and met President Lyndon B. Johnson.
But Franklin was also suffering. He had hand tremors, nightmares and always felt on edge. He was told he had a “nervous condition” and wasn’t diagnosed with PTSD until 2005.
“It was very traumatic. That’s the only way I could describe that,” said Franklin’s friend and pastor Louis Blevins. “The challenges that he’s had from that experience is ongoing. You never recover from some of those things.”
Despite his status as a disabled veteran, Franklin returned home and worked at Mansfield Tire, then Westinghouse. He married and had one daughter.
At one point, he began training to become a registered nurse, but found being back in a medical environment triggered his PTSD. Not long after, he took a civil service exam and was hired by the United States Postal Service. He worked for the USPS for 38 years, retiring as a training officer in 2012.
Despite his injuries, the PTSD and other physical ailments related to Agent Orange exposure, Franklin said enlisting was the best thing he ever did. It made him the person he is today.
“I would do it all over again,” he said. “I’m squared away now because at 17 years old, I got put on the right path. The first person in the morning that you have to respect is you.”
He pointed to his button up shirt and neatly ironed khaki slacks.
“I’m 75 years old, but see this crease in my pants?” he said. “My gig line is lined up. Everything’s squared away.”
Today, Franklin continues to give back as an elder at Latter Rain Church of God in Christ. Blevins said Franklin remains involved as a teacher and participant in the church’s outreach ministry.
“He’s a wonderful person. Great to get along with,” Blevins said. “He’s been faithful in what he’s doing.”
Want to read more stories about local veterans? Click here to check out our ten-part series on Medal of Honor winners from Richland County.