The Unforgotten Run to Tahoma National Cemetery

Origins of The Unforgotten, Run to Tahoma

In 2008, Mike Carroll, a founding member of the Kitsap County Veterans Advisory Board, read an article about the abandoned remains of deceased veterans at a funeral home in Missouri. Carroll contacted veterans advisory board staff to see if the Kitsap County Coroner's Office had any unclaimed remains. The coroner had six unclaimed veteran remains.

The weather was cold and rainy on October 2, 2008 when a small group of representatives from the Veterans Advisory Board, Combat Veterans International, and Kitsap communities received the remains of the six unclaimed veterans in the care of the county coroner and escorted them to Tahoma National Cemetery for the first Run to Tahoma.

The next event occurred on Saturday, Memorial Day Weekend in 2011, and became known as The Unforgotten, Run to Tahoma II. At their June 2011 meeting, the Kitsap County Veterans Advisory Board passed a motion that the ceremony would only occur when there was at least one unclaimed veteran in the care of the county coroner.