Lt. Col. Mars Macon Adkins, USMC (Ret.), formerly of Charlottesville, Virginia, peacefully departed this life at home on May 11, 2022, a sunny Wednesday morning soon after his 91st birthday, in Livingston, New Jersey, following years with Alzheimer’s Disease. Mars was born on April 30, 1931, in Clintwood, Virginia, the eldest child of the late Frank Macon Adkins and Snoda Elizabeth Mullins Adkins Rawlings.
Mars spent many of his formative years living with his widowed maternal grandmother, the late Cordelia Ann Culbertson Mullins, on the family homestead in Clintwood, Virginia. There he attended a one-room schoolhouse, where he so excelled in his studies that the schoolmarm permitted him to self-educate, spending many of his school days reading outside under the trees. When he later moved to Pikeville, Kentucky, he attended school with the children of the Hatfield and McCoy families.
Always industrious, Mars worked a variety of jobs as a boy and young man growing up in Appalachia. His lifelong love of coffee began in his early teenage years as part of his pre-dawn ritual preparing for his newspaper delivery route. One of his customers, William M. Ritter II of W. M. Ritter Lumber Company, took a personal interest in young Mars and encouraged him to study engineering in the hope that he would return to the company. Before heading off to college, Mars held a number of jobs with a subsidiary, the Red Jacket Coal Corporation, including one assignment which required a then 17-year-old Mars to drive a dynamite truck along icy mountain roads.
After an adventurous childhood in Appalachia, Mars studied for a year at West Virginia University before superb test results won him an ROTC scholarship and acceptance at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia. While Mars became a “Lawnie” who was selected for the privilege of residing in one of the coveted rooms on UVA’s Lawn adjacent to the Rotunda, on summer break he would return home to Coal Mountain, West Virginia to work inside the Red Jacket coal mines. He graduated in 1955 with a B.A. in Geology and, continuing a long family tradition of service to our country, he was immediately commissioned into the United States Marine Corps as a Second Lieutenant.
During his early years of service, Mars served duty tours at Quantico, Virginia, in Pensacola, Florida and in Okinawa, Japan, before assuming command of the Second Topographic Company at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. In the following years, he led covert coastal survey team operations in Europe, North Africa, the Persian Gulf and Asia. After graduating from the U.S. Army Engineer Officers’ Career Course, Mars was assigned to the Marine Corps Development and Education Command at Quantico as the Engineer Research/Development Officer for the development and testing of engineering, mapping, photographic and reproduction equipment. One of the projects initiated by Mars resulted in the adoption of a fiberglass resin beach matting known as MOMAT, which was familiar to many Marines of the era as the replacement for the World War II wire mesh matting.
During the Vietnam War, Mars served as one of the earliest Engineer Advisors to the Vietnamese Marine Brigade. His efforts starting in 1965 were instrumental in developing the Vietnamese Marines, and he received numerous awards and citations for his service in Vietnam. He was awarded the Bronze Star for his role in five major combat operations in Vietnam. At Pleiku in June 1965, he executed an emergency medical air evacuation after midnight, rigging the outline of a landing field by placing and lighting gasoline-soaked sand in C-ration cans to direct a successful helicopter landing and evacuation while under continual sniper fire. A true warrior poet, while serving in the field in Vietnam, Mars found solace in writing his Master’s thesis for his M.A. in Governmental Administration, which he received from the George Washington University in 1965.
Mars went on to serve as the Inspector-Instructor (I&I) of the 6th Engineer Battalion, USMCR, in South Bend, Indiana. During his tenure, the 1,300-man unit was recognized nationally as the outstanding battalion of the Marine Corps Reserve by the Marine Corps Reserve Officers Association. Mars also served during those years as the officer responsible for informing northern Indiana and southern Michigan families of the combat loss of a loved one. After returning to Okinawa as the Division Engineer of the 3d Marine Division, Mars graduated from the Armed Forces Staff College, served as the Facilities Officer at Headquarters, Fleet Marine Force, Pacific, and subsequently assumed duties as the Facilities Maintenance Engineer Officer at Parris Island, South Carolina.
Highly decorated during his outstanding career, Mars’s numerous distinguished service awards for acts of heroism in combat and exemplary leadership include the Bronze Star Medal with combat V, Navy Commendation Medal, Combat Action Ribbon, Navy Unit Commendation, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal with three stars, Republic of Vietnam Meritorious Unit Commendation with palm and Vietnam Campaign Service Medal with device.
It was during his breaks from combat operations in Vietnam that Mars met his wife, Khả Kim Thủy, in Saigon, where she worked at the U.S. headquarters. During their courtship, they would meet up to enjoy Cà-Phê Sữa Đá, Vietnamese iced coffee, while chaperoned by Thủy’s little brothers, one of whom followed in Mars’s footsteps to become a Vietnamese Marine. Following their marriage, Mars and Thủy settled in Kaneohe and Pearl City in Hawaii and later Parris Island, South Carolina.
In 1976, after a distinguished and rewarding 21 years serving his country as an Engineer Officer, Mars retired from the Marine Corps as a Lieutenant Colonel. He went on to a second career in the private sector, spending 15 years in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia as Engineer Facilities Manager with the Arabian American Oil Company, now known as Saudi ARAMCO. The outbreak of the First Gulf War prompted Mars’s second retirement, after which he and Thủy returned to the United States to settle in his beloved college town of Charlottesville, Virginia. Later in their retirement, Mars and Thủy relocated to New Jersey.
Mars was the grandson of James Sherman Mullins, a Federal Deputy Marshal, Justice of the Peace, City Policeman and Virginia State Prohibition Inspector who was killed in the line of duty in 1926 and whose name is inscribed on the National Law Enforcement Memorial. Mars’s mother was the last living grandchild of Isaac Mullins who, together with his father, “Holly Creek” John Mullins, and his elderly grandfather, “Revolutionary” John Mullins, was a settler and founder of Dickenson County, Virginia. Mars was also a four-times-great-grandson of Joel Ramsey, a member of the Commander-in-Chief’s Guard that protected General George Washington during the Revolutionary War.
Mars is survived by his beloved wife of more than 50 years, Kim Thủy Khả Adkins, of Livingston, New Jersey; three daughters, Karen Marie Adkins James (Dean) of Greenville, North Carolina, Tuyet Bach (Bạch Tuyết) Adkins Gould (Peter) of Los Angeles, California, and Frances Anne (Bạch Vân) Adkins Calcaño (Rey) of Short Hills, New Jersey. He is also survived by four grandchildren – Jacob (Luwella) and Elijah (Kimberly) James; Tessora Gould; and Bretton Adkins Calcaño; one great-grandchild – Hannah James; three sisters and one brother – Virginia Cooper of Fort Belvoir, VA; Anne King (Ralph Rogers) of Woodside, CA; Frankie Adkins (Wade Gambrell) of Honea Path, South Carolina; and John Adkins (Patricia) of Loris, South Carolina; a niece – Joni Lynn Adkins Gerald (Darin); a grandniece – Brianna Gerald; and several generations of the Khả family.
In addition to his parents, Mars was preceded in death by his first wife, Eva Netz Adkins Peffer, and infant son, Michael Patrick Adkins; his grandson, Nathan James, and infant granddaughter, Regan Adkins Calcaño; his father-in-law, Khả Hòa, and mother-in-law, Nguyễn Thị Lợi; and his brothers-in-law, LTG Kenneth B. Cooper, U.S. Army (Ret.), Khả Kim Hảo, Khả Kim Minh, Khả Kim Châu, Khả Kim Phát, Thao Doan and Thoa Dinh Nguyen, and sister-in-law, Khả Kim Huê.
Mars's legacy is founded in his quiet courage and determination, keen intelligence, strong work ethic, selfless devotion to his family and concern for his fellow man. Mars was a discreet man who didn't advertise his accomplishments, nor his acts of kindness and generosity. Together with Thủy, Mars was personally responsible for sponsoring and helping to resettle in the United States multiple households of two Vietnamese families that had served alongside or assisted the U.S. in the Vietnam War. Mars was always giving of himself and could be counted on in times of need.
Mars will be greatly missed for his love of the mountains, farm country, viticulture and wildlife, adventurous spirit in world travel and appreciation for other cultures, photography skills, handy-ness and Rube Goldberg-esque repair solutions, fondness for used bookstores and voracious appetite for books, especially those related to anthropology, astronomy and other scientific topics, westerns, poetry and the works of Ernest Hemingway and Mark Twain. While Mars was an accomplished bow and arrow hunter, he gave away his prize bucks so that friends could parade them around as their own, and he was at heart an animal lover who ultimately gave up hunting. Indeed, his life was enriched by a series of cherished pets, with canine companions including a Weimaraner, English Springer Spaniel, Norwich Terrier and American Pit Bull Terrier, as well as a succession of cats and grand-cats. Mars remained active well into his senior years, winning his age group uncontested in a 5K race on his 86th birthday. Mars was a devoted and loving son, brother, husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather, and a steadfast friend. He valued his family and his country above all else. Mars touched and improved the lives of many around the world and will be greatly missed by all who knew and loved him.
The family would like to thank the sisters and staff of the former Saint Francis Residential Community for their patient indulgence of Mars’s many adventures; the entire Brandywine Living team for their loving kindness and care over the last year; the aides, nurses, therapists, social workers, doctors, surgeons and other professionals of Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Saint Barnabas Medical Center, Daughters of Israel, the Visiting Nurse Association and Peace Aging Care; and Dr. Manisha Grover. They would also like to thank their friends, neighbors and colleagues who provided endless support over the years.
A visitation will be held Saturday, May 21, 2022, from 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm, at Quinn-Hopping Funeral Home, 145 E. Mt. Pleasant Ave., Livingston, New Jersey 07039.
A funeral service will be held Friday, October 7, 2022, at 1:00 pm, at the Joint Base Myer–Henderson Hall Old Post Chapel, Fort Myer, Virginia, immediately followed by interment with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery. Reception at Fort Myer will follow the graveside services. Visitors without military ID are requested to allow ample time for security check to enter the base and arrive at the Chapel no later than 12:15 pm.
In lieu of flowers, please consider honoring Mars with a memorial contribution to the Appalachia Service Project, an organization using volunteer labor to perform repairs to make homes “warmer, safer and drier” (https://asphome.org/), Cure Alzheimer’s Fund, the only nonprofit dedicated exclusively to finding a cure for Alzheimer’s disease (https://curealz.org/), or the Marine Corps Scholarship Foundation, the nation’s oldest and largest provider of need-based scholarships to military children (https://www.mcsf.org/).
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May God bless his soul and grant him eternal peace.
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