National League of POW/MIA Families

The National League of POW/MIA Families' origins date to groups created by Sybil Stockdale and a group of POW/MIA wives in 1966 in Coronado, California. Sybil Stockdale's husband, Navy Commander James Stockdale, was shot down in 1965 and she was determined to make the American people aware of the mistreatment of U.S. POWs. Years later Evelyn Grubb became involved because she was frustrated with the lack of information from federal officials. The National League of Families was incorporated nationally in 1967 and later in Washington, D.C., on May 28, 1970. The league gained increased international attention in 1972 when Life Magazine ran a feature article on the organization. In the 1980s a different group, the National Alliance Of Families For the Return of America's Missing Servicemen, was formed as a split-off by National League of Families members over a disagreement with then League President Ann Mills Griffith over tactics the organization should employ in pursuing its goals, and disagreements about the status of missing servicemen by the 1980s. Compared to the league, the National Alliance takes a more activist, radical stance, especially with regard to the Vietnam War POW/MIA issue and belief in the existence of "live prisoners" in Southeast Asia. ==Flag==

Then-League President and POW wife Evelyn Grubb oversaw the development of the now-famous National League of Families' POW/MIA flag in January 1972. The original design for the flag was created by the artist Newt Heisley for Annin Flagmakers in 1971 after Mary Hoff, wife of MIA Lt. Commander Michael Hoff U.S.N., recognized the need for a symbol for American POW/MIAs. Evelyn Grubb was then also a driving force in gaining the flag's adoption by the military, the U.S. Postal Service and other federal service agencies. Eventually the flag became widely popular and adoption of its use began to spread on its own, as the flag became a national symbol of Vietnam war remembrance. The flag, with the now widely recognized "You Are Not Forgotten, POW/MIA" logo is still flown in front of all U.S. post offices, all major U.S. military installations, and most fire stations, police stations, many state level agencies and also most veterans organizations chapters across the United States today, and is almost always present at most local and national veterans events in the United States. The flag is consequently still visible to millions of Americans on a daily basis. ==See also==