67 years ago today

This.

D-Day was definitely not in the same league as the daily hell that was the Eastern Front.

 

Assuming you're younger than 85, I ask (at least somewhat) respectfully, "How the hell would you know?"

 

'Nuff said.

 

My grandfather was there as well, but he died when I was young and never got a chance to hear what it was like. He did pass on some mementos, a Nazi medal he apparently was able to sneak back in, but never got a chance to hear his stories. His two children, my mother and uncle are also both long gone.

 

Average age was 25. A bunch of kids.

And, for what it's worth, the average age of the various German regiments was between 31 & 36:

http://bit.ly/ltSW8L

http://bit.ly/j31ugY

 

I'm tempted to say June 28, 1914 (the day Ferdinand and Sophie were assassinated by Gavrilo Princip) but when you read about all the build-up -- Alsace-Lorraine to Germany, the Schlieffen Plan, France's Plan XIV -- it almost seems inevitable that WWI was going to happen.

 

My grandpa was on the older side for the Americans. He was 32. He had like two years of training before being sent over in 'early 44 and he said he was fortunate to have the training instead of being thrown in like so many young guys.

Same story as most everyone here, he never spoke much about the horrors of the war but always had entertaining stories about the guys. He won the Silver Star for taking out a machine gun nest in spring of '45. He had nightmares the rest of his life of Germans coming up from the lake out at his farm to attack. My mom (who was his daughter-in-law but the one he talked to more than anyone) said that he once told her you never get over it "because those were someone's sons."

When he was in a hospice, I had a chance to interview him and finally get all the stories on tape. He still didn't talk much about the Silver Star incident but he talked for hours and hours and I was so grateful. One of the quotes I always remember is, "You've gotta accept that you're going to die, otherwise you'd go crazy out on the field." He died two months later but I'll still occasionally break out the tape, just to hear him.

 

Its somewhat unseemly to make something none of us had to endure a competition. Let's face it -- all war is hell.

My grandfather fought in the First World War -- Vimy Ridge and Paschendaele front lines, where the enemy was sometimes 20 yards away.

I've visited the battle fields. The ordinance craters have been preserved at some.

The biggest craters are the result of tunneling -- each side would attempt to tunnel underneath the enemies trenches, and then blow them up from underneath.

And then there was the gas. It would come creeping over the landscape and if you didn't have a mask, your lungs burned. An iffy solution was to urinate on your handkerchief and breathe through that - I believe the ammonia in the urine could briefly neutralize the gas.

Was D-Day the most important day of the 20th Century? That's tough to say. But it was certainly a triumph of sacrifice and a collective sense of purpose that we don't see in the Western culture anymore

 

That's awesome that you did that.

Folks, if you have an elderly parent or grandparent, do this. Whether they fought in WWII or not.

Especially since most of you should have better than average interview skills.

My cousin interviewed my grandmother before she died. It's great and hysterical.

 

Aug. 7, 1945 was the most important day of the 20th Century.

But both days should be remembered for the men and women who died fighting for our democracy.

 

Interview him on tape. Ease him into it. You'll have it for generations.

 

My grandfather was exactly the opposite. He'd talk about the war all day, but absolutely would not watch the movies.

We took him to the World War II Museum in New Orleans about two years before he died, and he had to leave about halfway through the tour because all the sound effects were too intense for him.