Major League Baseball .400 Hitter Selected as '6·25 War Hero'

Ted Williams, the "last .400 hitter" of Major League Baseball in the United States, has been selected as the Hero of the Korean War for July.

The Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs announced on the 30th, "Ted Williams, a legendary Major League hitter inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame and a captain in the U.S. Marine Corps who served during the Korean War, has been selected as the Hero of the Korean War for July 2023."

Captain Ted Williams served with the U.S. Marine Corps' 311th Marine Fighter Squadron and flew a total of 39 combat missions over the course of one year starting in May 1952. In February 1953, while bombing the southern area of Pyongyang, he experienced a harrowing incident where his aircraft was damaged by enemy anti-aircraft fire, but he managed to return safely to base. He demonstrated overwhelming performance as a Major League player both before and after his military service.

Before enlisting, Ted Williams was a leading player for the Boston Red Sox in Major League Baseball and achieved a batting average of .406 in 1941, joining the elite ranks of ".400 hitters." After returning to the Major Leagues following his Korean War service in 1953, he showcased peak skills by hitting .407 with 13 home runs in 37 games. He participated in a total of 19 seasons until his retirement in 1960, finishing with a career batting average of .344 and 521 home runs, earning induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs selected independence activists Kang Yoon-guk and Yoo Min-su, who carried out the Bumin-gwan bombing incident, as the Independence Activists of July 2023. The Bumin-gwan bombing incident occurred on July 24, 1945, when Kang Yoon-guk, Yoo Min-su, and Jo Moon-gi, members of the Korean Patriotic Youth League, detonated a bomb at Bumin-gwan (currently the Seoul Metropolitan Council), the venue of the "Asia Peoples' Outrage Conference," a mobilization event for Japan's invasion war.

This incident caused the Asia Peoples' Outrage Conference to be canceled, and although the Japanese authorities made every effort to capture the activists, they were defeated in less than a month. To honor their contributions, the government awarded Kang Yoon-guk the Order of Merit for National Foundation, Patriotic Medal in 1990, and posthumously awarded Yoo Min-su the same medal in 1990.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.