EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of a series highlighting local veterans that runs Mondays through Veterans Day. To suggest a veteran contact Metro Editor Marly Reichert at mreichert@tribtoday.com or call her at 330-841-1737.

LIBERTY — Carl New-Hensley served 4.5 years in the Navy during the Vietnam War, but he identifies as a Gold Star child, which is someone whose parent died while serving in the U.S. military.

“My father died when I was 2 years old. I spent my life as a Gold Star child. For 80 years, I’ve been a Gold Star child,” New-Hensley said.

New-Hensley’s father, Pvt. Kenneth E. New, a World War II Army veteran, died in combat in France on Nov. 11, 1944.

“In the last few years, I have been telling people about the fallen heroes. I am more concerned about the children who lost a parent serving in the military. We don’t pay enough attention to them. We should be celebrating them. That is what I tell people who thank me for my service,” New-Hensley said.

New-Hensley has been active in America’s Gold Star Families organization, a nonprofit organization that offers support to families who have lost a loved one while serving on active duty. New-Hensley helped set up a Gold Star Families Memorial Monument in Mentor. Growing up in Nevada, Missouri, without the support of a father in his life, New-Hensley dropped out of school and found himself in trouble with the law by age 15. He moved away from his mother and brothers to live with his aunt and uncle.

“My uncle controlled me pretty heavily. He was the only father I ever knew. He forced me to get a high school diploma. I ended up graduating from high school when I was 21,” New-Hensley said.

Following high school graduation, he enlisted in the Navy, entering boot camp in Great Lakes, Illinois. He trained to be a boiler technician, achieving the rank of second-class petty officer.

He served on three ships: USS Albany, a heavy guided missile cruiser (CG-10); USS Haynesworth, a DD-700 destroyer; and USS Topeka, a light guided missile cruiser.

“There are not many pictures of me on the ship as I was always down below working on boilers,” he said. “When I enlisted in the Navy, they sent me to the bottom of the ship, which is ‘asbestos heaven’. Everything down there is covered in asbestos. I tell people they couldn’t cremate me because I couldn’t burn after being around all that asbestos.”

Dry asbestos was mixed with water in a bucket and applied to the boiler’s pipes. The asbestos mixture also was poured behind brick firewalls near the boilers.

The training and experience New-Hensley received in the Navy directly transferred to civilian life. After being discharged from the Navy in 1968, he returned to Missouri, where he held various jobs, including maintenance and boiler technician roles. After gaining even more experience working on boilers, he was regarded as one of the top three boiler engineers in Kansas City. General Motors contacted New-Hensley, offering him a position as a boiler technician at the Kansas City Leeds Assembly Plant.

The Leeds Plant closed following multiple floods, and New-Hensley was transferred to the GM Lordstown plant in 1991.

“As a boiler operator in Lordstown, we supplied air and steam to the car plant, fabrication plant and van plant. We operated a waste heat boiler. We burned trash to make steam,” New-Hensley said.

After a total of 28 years at GM, New-Hensley was offered a buyout. He opted to take the buyout, not wishing to be transferred again.

New-Hensley has a patch on his jacket that says, “I May Not Have a PhD, But I Do Have a DD-214”, referring to a certificate of release from active military duty.

He said, “I may not have a college degree, but I spent four years earning this, the way anyone else earns a college degree.”

New-Hensley places five large military service-related flags across his front yard each Memorial Day and Veterans Day, the first being the American flag.

“I don’t worry so much about what I did. I worry more about what my dad did. I firmly believe some give some, and some give all. I only gave 4 and a ½ years, and my dad gave all,” he said.