Senator Tom Coburn, Congressman Dan Boren seek to honor Indian war hero

Tuesday, September 20th 2005, 8:44 pm

By: News On 6

MUSKOGEE, Okla. (AP) _ Members of Oklahoma's congressional delegation have introduced legislation to rename the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Muskogee after an American Indian war hero.

Under the legislation, the facility would be known as the Jack C. Montgomery Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center. Montgomery, a Medal of Honor winner and Cherokee Indian, died in 2002 at age 84.

Montgomery was born in Long in Sequoyah County before the Great Depression and enlisted in the famous 45th Division Thunderbirds of the Oklahoma National Guard while attending Bacone College in Muskogee.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt awarded the Medal of Honor to Montgomery for his actions near Padiglione, Italy, on February 22nd, 1944, resulting in eleven enemy kills and the taking of 32 prisoners.