Veteran's Remains Interred On Volcano Since WWII Returns Home

FORT LOGAN, Colo. -- The remains of a veteran of World War II, missing in action for more than 60 years, finally came home to Colorado Wednesday. The man had been buried in a grave on a volcano.

Navy Ensign Robert "Bob" Franklin Keller grew up in Denver and left Colorado in 1941. In 1942, the 24-year-old headed to Alaska to take part in the Kiska Blitz. The Navy knew his plane crashed in the side of a remote Alaskan volcano on the island of Kiska in the Aleutian Islands, but his body wasn't found and retrieved until recently.

On Wednesday, Keller was laid to rest at Fort Logan National Cemetery, back home after 64 years.

His sister, Eleanor Keller, said goodbye more than 60 years ago but she found comfort knowing he is now finally at rest.

"I think my aunt, while she had mixed feelings at the same time, knows it was important to her. It brought back good memories as well," said Robert Keller, Bob Keller's nephew.

On Keller's final flight, he and six crewmen died when their plane when down on Kiska Island. After more than 60 years interred in rugged terrain, the family nearly lost hope that the day where he would be buried properly would ever come.

"I think my aunt, and frankly, myself, were a little suspicious. It sounded almost a little too odd," Robert Keller said.

Among those who came to salute Keller was a peer who never met him but who shared a common experience -- duty in the invasion of Kiska.

"Knowing that I had been there on that island where he died, it was just appropriate that I make a presence," said World War II veteran Earl Clark.

Keller might have been embarrassed by this homecoming celebration but it was long overdue.

"He's obviously been in heaven a long time but still this has got to make him very proud," Robert said.

Clark had never met anyone in the family. He just read about the burial in the paper and said he felt he should be at the ceremony.

The family said it was impressed with the military's efforts to bring Keller home after all these years. His nephew said it certainly shows that the military means what it says when it talks about not leaving one man behind.