FAIRVIEW PARK, Ohio -- On Valentine’s Day, 1969, U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant James Patrick Witt was shot and killed in close combat as his foot patrol came upon an enemy camp in Vietnam. He was 21.

Two days later, two men in uniform approached the door of his family home in Fairview Park.

“I told my dad that there’s two, and he was sleeping, there’s two ... and I got about that far,” said Robert Witt, Jim’s younger brother, who was 13 at the time. "He leapt out of bed. Ran downstairs and I stayed upstairs and I heard his howling. I’m looking out my second floor window and I see my mom come back from Mass and I’m thinking, ‘Mom, don’t come in the house. Don’t come in the house. Your life is never going to be the same.’ Clear as a bell I can remember that.”

Life never was the same for Witt’s Mom and dad or for his four younger sisters and his brother, for his buddies in the class of 1965 from St. Edward High School in Lakewood, for his neighbors, his friends, his fellow Marines or for Donna Hill, the high school sweetheart who was sure they’d one day marry and live a long and happy life.

“When you’re that young you’re immortal, you know things like (dying) don’t happen,” she said. “We dated when I was a junior at Fairview High School. Jim was a senior at St. Edward. And we dated till the day he died in Vietnam.”

Jim Witt held the rank of 2nd Lieutenant in Delta Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, First Marine Division. He was leader of the 3rd Platoon. He wrote many letters to Donna, often ending them with “Pray for me.”

When Jim was buried at Holy Cross cemetery, the flag that draped his coffin was folded and given to the family. His brother Bob, who now lives in Miami, has kept it wrapped in plastic since then. Thursday, on the 50th anniversary of Jim Witt’s death, the flag was unfurled and raised in front of Fairview Park City Hall in a ceremony celebrating Jim Witt’s sacrifice for his country.

“Why keep a candle under a basket?” Bob Witt said, referencing a Gospel verse from the book of Matthew. “I want to share this flag. And I want people who are younger to understand that your neighbor, your classmate, made the sacrifice.”

Over the years, after the advent of the Internet, Bob Witt connected with the men who served with his brother. He has attended their reunions and kept his brother’s memory alive.

Witt’s 1965 St. Edward classmate James Redmond came up with the idea for the 50-year remembrance, which started with a Mass at St. Angela Merici Catholic Church across the street from City Hall.

“I just got it started,” said Redmond. “We’re all 71-year-olds now. He didn’t even get a chance to be 22.”

Marines were there. A bunch of Witt’s 1965 classmates were there. All of his siblings were there. So were the neighbors. And Donna, who went on to marry and had three kids and a full life and still never forgot the love she had for Jim.

Bob Walter, who was on the football team at St. Ed’s with Witt and was his roommate for a year at Miami University, remembered Witt’s commitment to country.

“He wanted to be a Marine. He wanted to go protect his country. He wanted to serve in Vietnam,” he told a gathering of about a hundred people in a community room at City Hall.

His commanding officer, Thomas Merton Cooper, recounted Witt’s valor and detailed his heroic actions on the day he died.

Active duty Marines presented his family with the Silver Star and the Bronze Star medals.

And Witt’s sister, Barb Cicerchi, told the crowd that for years, the family did not speak about their brother with others. The reception for Vietnam vets was so disheartening. And yet, in their home, “he was everywhere.” His Marine Corps sword once hung over the piano. It’s now part of a memorial inside City Hall.

Yesterday, it all came out. No one held back talking about Jim Witt, from his stellar performance as a small football halfback to his ability to bond with his St. Edward classmates having transferred in for his senior year from Archbishop Hoban High School in Akron.

They talked about how he became an instant leader of his platoon in Vietnam, how he faithfully wrote letters, how as a kid he got into a lot of mischief that sometimes required him to sneak into the house after hours through his sisters’ room.

Fifty years later, a portrait of a young man who served his country with honor emerged.

Bob Witt fought back tears as his brother’s flag was hoisted, then lowered to half staff.

“Fifty years after we buried him at Holy Cross,” he said, “I feel like we buried my brother today.”