We are partnering with Ragtag Cinema to provide a free screening of the documentary film “Manchu: A Brotherhood of Sacrifice” on Veterans Day, November 11, 2026 at 6:00 p.m. The film follows the history of the Vietnam War as told by veterans of the Manchus (U.S. Army 4th Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division) who served in country 1966-70. There will be a question and answer portion with local veterans after the film. For more info, check out the event page for Daniel Boone Regional Library.
Among the many veterans in this film is Stan Adams of Callaway County, Missouri. Adams, who has written the memoir “Mokane to Mole City,” previously gave us an interview about the book back in 2020 that you can read on our website.
We decided to ask Stan Adams a few questions about the film ahead of the upcoming showing, and you can see the answers below. His wife Rita Adams, who is listed as a producer on the film, also contributed to this interview.
Daniel Boone Regional Library: You were involved early on with the film. Can you tell us more about that process?
Stan Adams: Matt Wilcox, the film director, contacted us in June, 2020 during Covid. Steve Knowlton, a shop teacher at Matt’s Springstead High School in Springhill, Florida, served with the 4/9 Manchus. Matt initially was going to make a small documentary about Steve, but then he found my Vietnam memoir “Mokane to Mole City” and knew he wanted to make it larger and expand the time period covered. Matt drove from Florida and spent four nights with us, filming me and my hometown of Mokane, Missouri, and also filming David Hosenfelt who lives in Callaway County like we do. Though the documentary isn’t directly about the book, it served as a resource guide for Matt to use, researching some of the Manchu history. Many of the people featured in the film are also in the book.
Matt drove to Missouri twice, Georgia once, and several towns in Florida to interview the 19 people my wife Rita lined up. He recorded and interviewed 15 Manchu’s, 1 Manchu widow, 2 helicopter pilots and 1 helicopter door gunner. Matt hired a local man in Vietnam to take current footage of the top of Nui Ba Den in Vietnam. The US military owned and operated their intelligence base on top of the mountain during the Vietnam War and the Manchus served near it so they saw it every day, some even being helicoptered there for a specific mission. Today the top of the mountain is a spiritual and tourism complex. He also filmed the area where the Mole City Base Camp and Mole City Battle of 12/22/1968 were — today it’s a rice field. Matt did the military research, wrote the narrative to accompany his film and hired a wonderful narrator for the film, Joe Geoffrey from Amarillo, Texas. It took Matt four years to complete his documentary. He produced the film, found archival footage from the war to include, did the editing, went through two computers, and spent $20,000 of his own money to make his film. We have no idea how many hundreds, if not thousands of hours Matt spent to bring his documentary to life.
The original film was shown at William Woods University in Fulton, MO on Sat. May 18, 2024. We billed it as a “Welcome Home Vietnam Vets” event and had over 400 people attend the red-carpet day. Shortly after, Matt entered it into film festivals. It received a Critics Choice Award at the 17th annual Iowa Independent Film Festival in September 2024. In December 2025, Leesburg, Florida’s Lake Front TV was honored with a Gold Telly Award for the broadcast of his original film “Manchu: A Brotherhood of Sacrifice” in the General-History category for “Honoring compelling historical storytelling.”
In late 2024, Rita reached out to Michael O’Keefe, the programing and communications manager for KMOS/PBS to see if they’d be interested in showing the documentary. After he previewed it, they were! First though, Matt needed to shorten the film to just less than two hours for their programming guideline and we had to get closed captioning added. Thankfully, from the red-carpet event at William Woods University we had a little sponsorship funds left over so we were able to pay the $500 expense for closed captioning. To our delight, on April 29, 2025, KMOS premiered the film, piggy backing it with the 50th anniversary of the Fall of Saigon on April 30, 2025. We were honored too that KMOS chose to put the movie on the cover of their April “CONTACT” Program Guide! In the inside cover, they included a small write up about the film and my mentor Staff Sergeant Leonard Simpson, who Matt chose as the face of the movie. KMOS also included a full page story with some of the Manchu history, and the connection of me and David Hosenfelt being from Callaway County, Missouri.
DBRL: How has the reaction to the film been within the Manchu community?
Adams: The documentary has been very well received within the Manchu community even though it doesn’t cover the Manchus’ entire service period they were there, which was four years and seven months — they first arrived April 29, 1966 on the USNS General Nelson M. Walker. With Matt first being in contact with Bravo Company’s Steve Knowlton and me and then with Alpha Co. David Hosenfelt, Matt ‘s film and my book start out telling about the Thanksgiving Eve battle on Nov. 27,1968 and then the Mole City battle on Dec. 22, 1968. Steve’s dates with Bravo Co. were Jan. 1969-Jan. 1970 (he was a replacement for the B Co. men injured or killed at Mole City, like I was a replacement after the Thanksgiving Battle). The film also covers several incidents (fire fights or mortars being shot at our base camp) from Jan. 1969 through Aug. 5, 1969 when Staff Sergeant James Donnelly (from St. Louis, MO) was killed in action. We are forever grateful to Matt Wilcox for taking an interest in the Manchus’ history and wanting to record their stories. Matt serving in the Armed Reserves, he had a military perspective.
Matt has said that he’d like to make a second Manchu documentary, focusing on their earlier service April 1966-mid November 1968. We do feel bad for the men who served during this time because each story told is so important and a life remembered is never lost. To date though, Matt has been working on some other projects.
We hope in the future that more Manchu history can be preserved. For example, three Manchus were posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest award for valor: 1st Sgt. Maximo Yabes, Oakridge, OR, Alpha Co. (died Feb. 26, 1967); 1st LT. Ruppert Sargent, Hampton, VA, Bravo Co. (died March 15, 1967 ) and SP4 Nicholas Cutinha, Alva, FL, Charlie Co. (died March 2, 1968). Some more examples are March 2, 1968 where Charlie Co. tragically lost 49 Manchus in just a couple of minutes in the Hoc Mon Ambush, and March 12, 1970 where a helicopter crashed returning to base camp killing nine Bravo Manchus and the four crew of 128th Assault Helicopter Company. There’s so much history to still tell the world of the Manchus service and sacrifice.
DBRL: Has the film changed your perspective of your experience in Vietnam in some way?
Adams: I see now how the documentary has changed my life for the better — I think the Vietnam veterans are finally beginning to be honored for their service and sacrifice. The red-carpet at William Woods University was a glorious day. We will never forget it. When returning home I got a bad attitude just as we were landing, because we were told “not to wear our uniforms home” because of the protests going on. BUT I DID – my buddies and I had fought and several died, so I wasn’t going to let anyone try to make me feel ashamed of our service. It was hard to understand the protests, but in the long run, maybe the actions of the college students and other citizens helped the war end sooner than it would have, but no matter what, they shouldn’t have ever targeted the returning veterans. In the wars since, most of the American public show their thanks and appreciation as they should. After I was home for a while, I began to question if the US government should have gotten the military involved in Vietnam, but they did, and we were told it was to stop the spread of Communism, but the Vietnamese people just wanted to grow their rice and live in peace. When you see your brothers dying, it’s hard to listen to anything negative. The documentary has allowed some of us Vietnam War veterans to tell our stories of what we went through, especially honoring our comrades who made the ultimate sacrifice. Being able to lift their names up, honoring them and the Gold Star families has provided additional healing to each of us.
Because of the documentary, Matt Wilcox’s former teacher Steve Knowlton was finally able to connect with Nell Higgins about her brother Sgt. Merle Higgins (Mercer, PA), who was killed June 5, 1969 — Steve was with Merle that tragic day. A similar connection was made just recently during the annual Manchu reunion in Springfield, Illinois — David and Judy Hosenfelt were finally able to connect with Colleen Lodewyck Becker, the niece of John Roger Ryan, Jr., from Belwood, IL. They drove towards Chicago and met at the Queen of Heaven Catholic Cemetery in Hillside, IL where David was able to finally pay his respects in person to his friend John who was killed so many years ago on Nov. 27, 1968. We know how hard that was because us and my Manchu buddies Bob Norton, Darrel Cavin and Tom Kelly and their wives have paid our respects to the graves of Gary Everette (Athens, TX) who was killed December 22, 1968 at the Mole City Battle, Moises Herrera, Jr. (Pleasanton, TX) who died unexpectedly on Nov. 2, 1969, almost a year after being injured Thanksgiving Eve in 1968, my young buddy Gilbert Bargmann (Hannover, ND) who lost his life June 19, 1969, and Staff Sergeant James Donnelly, Jr. (St. Louis, MO) who was killed Aug. 5, 1969.
DBRL: Anything else you’d like to add?
Adams: On Monday, October 26, I am being interviewed by Dr. Preston Jones, Professor for the History Department at John Brown University, Siloam Springs, Arkansas, for his Stuff of Life – War & Life Project which features discussions with veterans. A part of it was, we e-mailed him my pictures from Vietnam and he made a video of them. We hope you enjoy seeing them too. Veterans interested in participating in the project should contact Dr. Jones at 479-238-8688 or PJones@jbu.edu.
We are honored that Columbia’s Daniel Boone Regional Library and Ragtag Cinema have partnered up to show the Manchu documentary on Veterans Day, Wed. Nov. 11 6-8, with a 30 minute Q&A following the program. We appreciate everyone’s interest and look forward to meeting everyone.
Autographed copies of Mokane to Mole City will be available before or after the film, $40/cash/Venmo. Autographed copies are also available exclusively on our daughter Kim Force’s website www.Luckysnipe.com (search for the name of the book), and on Amazon. The book is also available to check out from the Daniel Boone Regional Library, which has locations in Ashland, Columbia, Fulton, and Holts Summit.
“Manchu: A Brotherhood of Sacrifice” is available streaming for free on the PBS website and app.
