Bill Bradford, a former Pacific Stars and Stripes staffer who twice served in Stripes’ Vietnam Bureau in the 1960s, died Wednesday of a heart attack. He was 84.

Bradford, a retired Army master sergeant, died in the Colorado Springs (Colo.) Memorial Hospital at 11:55 a.m. Wednesday, with longtime friends at his side.

He was born in New York and joined the Royal Canadian Air Force before the United States officially entered World War II. He saw action in Africa and Europe.

He joined the U.S. Army in 1948 and volunteered for service in Korea during the war. He was stationed in Japan and along the front lines during the Korean War.

The journalist and photographer, selected to serve with Pacific Stars and Stripes in Japan in 1953, pulled several assignments with the newspaper in Japan, as well as serving twice as Korea news bureau chief and two times with the Stripes’ Vietnam bureau during the 1960s.

He was married to Toku, his wife of three decades, who died in 1981. He is survived by his sister, Mrs. Lillian Stein.

Bradford requested to be buried in uniform at Colorado’s Fort Logan Veterans Administration Cemetery.

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