It was 4 p.m. Christmas Day, 1966, when the sound came that every serviceman's family dreaded, the slow knock, knock, knock of someone's knuckles tapping against the door.

Gayle Hadesty turned from her 8-month-old baby, and through the beveled glass of the front door could make out two people wearing white uniforms.Even now, nearly 50 years later, her eyes brim with tears and her voice falters."They let me know my husband had been wounded," she said. "Then at midnight that night there was another knock at the door and the local police brought me a telegram, that he'd gotten shrapnel in the face during a fight Dec. 21st."Dave Hadesty's father was a World War I veteran; Gayle's father was a World War II veteran. The two met while attending Tamaqua High School, graduating in 1964, and reside in Tamaqua.Dave joined the Navy Reserves and was sent to Corpsman school in the Great Lakes, where he received medical training. He was then stationed in Portsmouth, Virginia, before being sent to Spain.Since the Spain orders were for a three-year stint, Gayle moved to Spain. But less than a year later, Dave got orders for deployment to Vietnam. He went to Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, for training and left for Vietnam in November 1966, where he was a Navy Corpsman assigned to a Marine Corps combat unit."We had a base camp but sometimes we'd go out for two weeks, and we'd stay in tents or dig a hole," he said. "The corpsman was usually in the middle of the group so he could help the wounded from either direction."Hadesty took shrapnel from a grenade that hit the ground and exploded somewhere in front of him. As he was taken out, the helicopter came under heavy fire and landed riddled with bullet holes."They cleaned me up and I got to see the Bob Hope Christmas Show in Da Nang, with front row seats," he recalled. "I got sent back on Dec. 29th and I was back out on patrol New Year's Eve."Two months later, Hadesty had a brush with death that spared him by fractions of an inch. Out on patrol, his unit was ambushed."We got fired on and I got as low as I could be, crawling through a rice paddy," he said. "A bullet went right through my helmet and cut into the back of my heel."The helmet, mounted on a plaque that also has a replica of the bullet, sits atop the Hadestys' entertainment center. To the left of the center is a photograph of Gayle's father in uniform. On the opposite wall, a photograph of Dave's father in uniform and also a frame containing the telegram from Vietnam and various service awards Hadesty earned.Hadesty was awarded two Purple Hearts and brought a third Purple Heart to its deserved destination. Gayle's father, Elvin Jones, was wounded in the leg, stomach and arms during World War II and nearly lost his life; 69 years later, Dave persevered through the red tape and the Army awarded Jones' Purple Heart.The couple had three boys, each four years and three months apart, and four grandchildren. After he was wounded a second time, Hadesty was pulled from the combat area and served in a medical triage area until he was transferred back to the states, where he served in the Philadelphia Navy Hospital.He worked as a meat cutter for Weis Markets for 35 years; Gayle worked in the Tamaqua Area School District cafeteria for 40 years."When he first came back, he wasn't comfortable walking along a sidewalk, next to the buildings. He wanted to walk in the street," Gayle said. "He was always on guard, looking at windows."But that didn't last long. The Hadestys devoted themselves to working hard and raising their family."Our sons have done very well and we're very proud of them. We have a carpenter, an electrician and a mason," Hadesty said. "But even now, all these years later, it still bothers me when I hear a helicopter, and sometimes there are triggers that take me right back."When that happens, Hadesty pushes the memories away and has a standard answer when Gayle asks him what's wrong."He just tells me that it's nothing I need to know," Gayle said. Behind her is a sign that reads Home of the Free, Because of the Brave. "And I remember how he looked when he came home, and I believe him."