WASHINGTON -- The White House announced plans Monday to grant a Presidential Medal of Freedom to Bonnie Carroll, founder of an organization that provides support to grieving military families -- and the star of a true Alaska love story.
Carroll was working in the White House in 1988 when three California gray whales trapped in Arctic ice garnered international attention. President Ronald Reagan's interest in the plight led the West Wing staffer to meet her future husband, Alaska Army National Guard Col.Tom Carroll. Their love story was later featured in the 2012 film "Big Miracle."
In 1992, after he and Bonnie were married, then-commander of the Alaska Army National Guard and lifelong Alaskan Tom Carroll died in an Army C-12 plane crash in the Chilkat Mountains -- along with seven other top Guard leaders -- en route to Juneau. Tom Carroll's father, Maj. Gen. Thomas P. Carroll, had died 28 years earlier in a plane crash at Valdez while providing relief work after the 1964 Good Friday earthquake, Bonnie Carroll said.
Carroll channeled her grief into action, and following her husband's burial at Fort Richardson National Cemetery in Anchorage, she founded the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS), which provides support for those impacted by the death of a member of the U.S. military.
Bonnie Carroll will be honored with the nation's highest civilian honor next week for her work after her husband's death.
In an interview Monday, Carroll said that at the time of the crash, there was no organization to help those left grieving after the death of someone in the military.
"So, with support from many Alaskans, TAPS was created, founded right there in Anchorage," she said.
The military quickly adopted the program, and it has since been replicated across the globe, in the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Israel and Germany, among others, Carroll said.
"Whenever a service member makes the ultimate sacrifice in service to this country, his family is ... connected with TAPS. So out of an Alaska tragedy came hope and healing for tens of thousands of military families," she said.
TAPS includes peer-based support, a help line, seminars and retreats.
"Twice a year we bring widows and parents from around the country to Alaska to participate in healing activities," Carroll said.
The organization remains headquartered in Anchorage.
"It's really kind of nice that this is coming full circle," Carroll said, noting that she will return to the West Wing of the White House -- where she was working when she first met her husband -- to receive the award.
"Bonnie Carroll is a life-long public servant who has devoted her life to caring for our military and veterans," the White House said in announcing the recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. TAPS brings "healing comfort and compassionate care to the living legacies of our nation's service and sacrifice," the White House said in its description of Carroll, noting that she is also a retired major in the Air Force Reserve, serves on the Defense Health Board and previously chaired a task force focused on preventing military suicide.
Carroll will be one of 17 granted the Presidential Medal of Freedom in a Nov. 24 ceremony, an honor given to those "who have made especially meritorious contributions to the security or national interests of the United States, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors," according to the White House.
Others receiving the award include NASA mathematician Katherine G. Johnson, baseball hall-of-famer Willie Mays, retiring Maryland Sen. Barbara Mikulski, conductor Itzhak Perlman, composer Stephen Sondheim and movie director Steven Spielberg. Posthumous recipients include Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, Native rights advocate Billy Frank Jr., and human rights leader Minoru Yasui.