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01-06-2013, 05:08 PM | #1 |
Baba Ganoush
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WW2 was the most interesting topic in history class.
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01-06-2013, 05:20 PM | #2 |
fides quaerens intellectum
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If I were you, I would try to find if there are any surviving members of your grandfather's platoon, who would have served right next to him. It would be worth contacting them and trying to get some stories about their particular experience. Perhaps one of them has/had written something - whether it be a journal at the time, or a memoir of some kind afterward. They would almost certainly remember your grandpa.
These platoons often met up for reunions, though most have stopped simply because there aren't many living or able bodied WWII veterans anymore. |
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01-06-2013, 06:18 PM | #3 | |
Mahomes or GTFO
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Although he didn't talk about the war much, his oldest brother, my great uncle Dewey, lived until 2004 and I got a good bit of information from him. He was also an airborne infantryman and I believe he said he was in the 82nd Airborne division. He fought during D-day and then did a major drop during operation Market Garden. The second day of the operation, he was shot 7 times in the left leg, abdomen and chest. He remembers blacking out and waking up in a hospital. When I was a little kid, my cousins and I would ask to see his 'bellybuttons', since his wounds on his chest all looked like bellybuttons...that's what he told us they were. He always talked about how nice the weather was the day he got shot. I remember his saying something along the lines of 'I was just admirin' how good the warm September sun felt and listening to the wind blow through the trees when all of a sudden it sounded like every gun in Europe was goin' up. Then I just woke up in the damn hospital." haha.
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01-06-2013, 05:24 PM | #4 |
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Oh, my neighbor fought in the Pacific during WWII. I asked him some questions, but you could tell he didn't want to talk about some things.
He carried a BAR. He passed away a few months ago. RIP Nate. You were a hell of a guy! |
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01-06-2013, 05:33 PM | #5 |
MVP
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Very cool find!
My grandfather would not speak of his service in the war. He adamantly refused to take his wife to Europe for a vacation because of the experience. "Mud and Blood" may have been muttered once, but other than that I have nothing but a couple of his service pictures. A generation all to their own. |
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01-06-2013, 05:45 PM | #6 |
Starter
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Very cool. Hang on to those.
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01-06-2013, 05:38 PM | #7 |
DT CARD COLLECTOR
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Very awesome!
I'm a WWII nut, so that kind of stuff really peaks my interest let alone it was your Grandad's. I hope the family can hold onto it and never has to sell it.
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01-06-2013, 05:41 PM | #8 |
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This was indeed the greatest generation. My grandpa fought in WW1 and my dad in Korea and one brother in Nam. That generation did the most bad ass things ever and then spawned one of the worst generations. Its understandable, they were told at the time that this was the war to end all wars. When they came home they wanted to provide for their children a better life growing up and have them want for nothing.
What was lost is a kick ass work ethic and a long standing history of tough as nails self reliance. |
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01-06-2013, 06:17 PM | #9 | |
Space Cadet and Aczabel
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VARSITY
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01-06-2013, 05:48 PM | #10 |
(Sir/Yes Sir/Aye Aye Sir)
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I love stuff like this... Awesome....
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01-06-2013, 06:53 PM | #11 |
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Oh man I love WWII stuff. My grandpa was young and got in late so he was a prison guard of captured German soldiers. His brother was one of the first to land on Omaha Beach and was immediately greeted with a bullet 1/8th of an inch from his spine and got a trip back home. But my uncle's (married to my moms sister) dad spent two years fighting in Europe and ended up a POW in a Nazi prison camp and survived...now that's where some real stories are!
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01-06-2013, 07:18 PM | #12 |
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My father in law was a bombadeer that was with one of the planes that bombed either Hiroshima or Nagasawki , don't know which one , he died well before I met my wife. But we have before and after pictures of the devastation from the bomb that he took from his plane.
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01-06-2013, 07:19 PM | #13 | |
Mahomes or GTFO
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01-06-2013, 07:55 PM | #14 | |
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01-06-2013, 07:49 PM | #15 |
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My great uncle was a tail gunner in a Liberator. The aircraft was shot down and he perished.
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