While the Texas High School class of 1953 was going to class, James Spriggs and Hershel Brown Jr. were going to war.

But 55 years after they enlisted in the Navy, the two Korean War veterans -- one still alive, the other represented by his widow -- have been awarded honorary high school diplomas.

"At the time it meant serving the country, " James Spriggs said of his decision to leave high school and join the Navy. "I went in the day I was 17 years old and served four years."

The state of Texas lets school districts award diplomas to veterans who fought in World War II, the Korean War and Vietnam.

Spriggs jumped at the chance. He expressed sadness his good friend could have been with him. Brown died in 1999.

"His widow is here today, and as she told me when I called her, 'Junior would be proud,' and he would," Spriggs said.

"I think he's smiling down and he does know that this is happening," Brown's widow, Doris, said of her husband.

Doris Brown said her husband stressed the importance of education to their children.

"He said, 'If you want to be a ditch digger that's OK, but I want you to be an educated ditch digger because you'll have a choice if you have an education,'" she said.