Oct 03 2009
Kansas Vets Heading to Washington DC
I’m getting excited because tomorrow, Grandpa & I are heading to Kansas City on the first leg of our veterans Honor Flight. It’s been a long wait, we applied to go last summer, but at long last our day has arrived.
I’ve been loading pictures on to my iTouch so we can talk & discuss. I scanned in Grandpa’s WWII photo album a few years ago, but we’ve never really discussed them in much detail. He and I served in the same part of the world, but some 40 years apart. Grandpa served in New Guinea, the southern Philippines, and occupied Japan. I spent a great deal of time in Japan and in the Philippines during my Navy service, and one of the highlights of my time over there was my visit to the Manila American Cemetary. It wasn’t a place I would have thought to visit on my own, but Grandpa wrote to me and told me if I ever got the chance, he would appreciate my visiting the grave of his fallen comrade buried there. Fortunately, I once did have the chance to go, and was honored to bring home photographs of his friend’s marker for him.
The pictures at the top of this post were made when we were both around 20 years old, Grandpa had his portrait made in Japan after the war had ended, and my portrait was made at my recruit training graduation in Great Lakes, IL. I thought it would be interesting to put them together to see how much I resemble my granddad.
We are both really looking forward to this trip. My connection to Grandpa while I was serving in the Pacific made me pay more attention to historic places I saw such as Corregidor and Nagasaki. I have always been proud of him and I know he was proud of me as well. Now we are going to see the WWII memorial together for what will be an unforgettable trip!
2 responses so far
Create a free edublog to get your own comment avatar (and more!)
This is great, Bill. I’m glad you all are going. My grandfather was in the Navy during WWII and served mostly on Attu and in the Pacific. He was training to be underwater demolition (frogman) when the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. He remembers being in the Philippines when the survivors of the Bataan Death March were brought over. He has some amazing stories. Personally, I just want to thank both you and your grandfather for your service to the country. Enjoy your trip!
Dana, If your grandfather is still living and healthy enough for travel, I HIGHLY recommend you get his name on the Honor Flight waiting list if he hasn’t made this trip already. This program is free to all WWII veterans and simply an amazing experience. Heck, you could even take him as his guardian. My grand dad doesn’t get around so well, but he was healthy enough to ride the airplane to D.C. and he was just fine on the entire trip.
Check it out at the Honor Flights website.