Staff Sgt. John Mann has been a man lost to history for the past 83 years.

During World War II, Mann was assigned to 22nd Material Squadron at Hickam Airfield on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. On. Dec. 7, 1941, following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese aircraft expanded to Hickam Field, targeting U.S. aircrafts and ships, barracks, supply buildings, and the base chapel. The attack lasted four hours. Mann was reportedly killed during this time.

But, unlike others who have made the ultimate sacrifice for their country, Mann doesn’t have a grave site near his hometown where tribute can be paid every Memorial Day or where family members could go to grieve their loved one in the days, weeks, years and decades since the war’s end. Not that the Mann family didn’t try. As recently as 1986 the family tried to get the government to reopen the investigation into Mann’s death.

Thanks to Rick Stone, the Mann family finally has some answers. The Chief Rick Stone and Family Charitable Foundation help families investigate and identify the whereabouts of their Missing in Action and Prisoner of War family members. The work dates back to 2002 for Stone, who uses a system he developed while serving as the Dallas, Texas, chief of police that takes basic biometric information and uses that to make predictions and matches to help identify remains. When Stone retired from law enforcement he was given a position with the Department of Defense to help search for World War II soldiers who are missing in action and prisoners of war. There are still around 8,000 soldiers like Mann across the country.

It was while he was assigned to look into those killed in Pearl Harbor that Stone made the discovery of the unknowns buried in Schofield Barracks Cemetery that served in the Army at Hickman Field, Hawaii. After the attack, Mann’s body was identified and he was listed as being sent to the Schofield Barracks Cemetery for burial, but his identification became separated from his body and he was buried as an unknown.

Stone began working on the case in 2022. Mann was listed by Stone’s RISC system as a most likely match to only two unknown soldiers from Schofield who were later buried in the Punchbowl Cemetery. Stone and the foundation’s investigations were offered to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, which led to Mann’s recovery from the Punchbowl Cemetery.

Mann is also a unique case, Stone said, in that he was only 22 years old and had served in the Army for two years, but had already risen to the rank of Staff Sergeant.

“He is buried in a beautiful cemetery but his headstone only says ‘Unknown’. He lost not only his life but his name, and had no visitors to his grave because no one knew he was there. I was probably the first to visit Mann’s grave since he was buried there. The foundation and I are on a quest, you could say, to get them their names back,” Stone said.

There aren’t many people left in Chautauqua County, if any, who knew John Mann. Perhaps the greatest gift Stone has given is that, for a few weeks, Mann’s name was back in headlines in Chautauqua County so that we can once again remember his service and say, once again, a somber thank you to a young man who didn’t flinch when under attack by the enemy on a day that still lives in infamy. John Mann died a hero. Rick Stone and his foundation are heroes for a different reason.