LT. Jack Hugele

  Apache Troop Platoon Leader. It was his job to make sure they all made it home at the end of each mission.

lT. RB Alexander

  RB was the Platoon Leader before Jack Hugele. He retired from the Army but then served in Iraq as an adviser in 2004.

Lt. Gary QualleY

Lt. Qualley served as the Apache Troop leader in between Lt. Alexander and Lt. Hugele. He was shot several times during combat, suffering serious wounds that required months of hospitalization.   

CSM Tony Cortez (RET)

  After Vietnam, Tony stayed in the military and went on to fight in Panama, Grenada and the first Gulf War before retiring as a Command Sergeant Major.

Sgt. Joe Sanchez

Wounded on the same day as Lt. Qualley, Sgt. Sanchez served four months with Apache Troop. In that time, he was in 78 firefights.  

Sgt. Kregg Jorgenson

  An Army Ranger before joining Apache Troop. He loved walking point and being out in front of the team. A strategy that backfired on March 25th, 1970. 

SGT. Ed Beal

  A veteran of two tours of duty. He was a Ranger before joining Apache Troop where he served as Assistant Team Leader and Point Man.

Sgt. Charlie Ochoa

Sgt. Ochoa served as an Army Ranger team leader for seventeen months. 

sgt. James Braun

  Company Radio Telephone Operator (RTO). The last line of defense, he called in chopper and artillery support on their position.

Spec. 5 Richard “Doc” Del Valle

  Company medic. He routinely risked his own life to run into fire to help wounded and fallen soldiers.

Spec 4 Duane Bloor

 Company heavy machine gunner. Duane received a Silver Star for his actions during their battle on March 19th, 1970. They call that “the day they should have died”. In Kregg’s view, if it wasn’t for Specialist Bloor, many of them them would have.

Crew

Dave Merlino

(WriterDirector) is a former federal law enforcement officer with a focus in counterterrorism. He left the government in 2011 to cofound Rainbows and Unicorns Entertainment, LLC with his friend and business partner, Dustin Sweet. 

It is Dave’s relationship with Kregg Jorgenson that has been the driving force in bringing this project to life. 

Dustin Sweet

(WriterDirector) is an animation artist with work in the film, television, and music industries. Starting out in Taos as an award winning painter, he picked up photography in college and transitioned easily into cinematography as his work moved into effects animation.

Dr. Jack Faris PH.D 

(Producer) Jack Faris holds the Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Chicago. His dissertation was on Basic Combat Training in the Transition from Conscription to the All-Volunteer Force. After a successful academic career, with promotion to associate professor with tenure at Towson University, Jack moved to Seattle and took a position with the city’s largest advertising agency. 

Charles Schaefer

(Director of Photography)
In love with the process and those he meets along the way, Charles has been documenting stories that renew the spirit and capture the unseen.

Chris Duerkopp

(Additional Camera) has worked with Dave and Dustin on every project since their beginning and served as Director of Photography on their short HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAD.