A Great Salvation for America

The best and most beautiful things in this world cannot be seen or even heard, but must be felt with the heart.

~~ Helen Keller ~~

During the terrible winter of 1777-78, while the Continental army lay encamped at Valley Forge, Isaac Potts was passing through the woods near General Washington’s headquarters. Making his way amid the groves and snow covered, wooded paths he suddenly heard the sound of a nearby voice. Startled, Potts cautiously drew closer while the words became clearer. Eventually, he could hear the voice speaking in great earnest.

Soon he could see the man. There, in a dark natural bower of ancient oaks, he saw the commander-in-chief of the American army. It was General George Washington on his knees, in the snow, in prayer.

Me the Patriot and the Realities of War

Patriotism is as much a virtue as justice, and is as necessary for the support of societies as natural affection is for the support of families.

Benjamin Rush, Letter to His Fellow Contrymen: On Patriotism,
October 20, 1773

As a writer I tend to spread my thoughts around. From notes to myself, emails to others, to Facebook posts and my own personal history (to be shared with my family) and to this blog to be shared with the world (at least anyone with the time and interest to read it).

What follows is a compilation of all those things I think about when I think of patriotism and my love for country and the awful necessity of war.

A little of it may have already been shared here, but things of such weighty measure are often worth repeating.

Howard Thayne of the 463rd

Today Italy’s Celone airfield has returned to nature and agriculture. One couldn’t know the activities, the machines and the hero’s who once occupied this Italian countryside. Only from the air can be seen the faint scarring of the landscape. Hidden are the fading remnants of taxiways and the 6,000 foot runway that gave pathway to the heavy B-17 bombers, their crews and payloads of America’s 15th Air Force.

The faint runway (center), taxiways and other roads of what used to be Celone Airfield.

One of those crew members came from Salt Lake City, via Canada, then England. His name is Howard Thayne. He is my children’s first cousin, two generations removed. Their maternal grandfather and Howard are first cousins. Born on March 23, 1919 in the coal mining camp of Kenilworth, Utah, Howard’s  family would move to Salt Lake where he was the typical American boy, sociable and popular among his peers. He graduated from West High School and at the age of 19 served a two-year mission for the LDS Church in Canada. Soon after his return home, with the outbreak of World War II, Howard enlisted in the Army Air Corps.

Music Monday – Flanders Fields

It was the early days of World War I in the Second Battle near the town of Ypres. A 22-year old Canadian artillery officer, Lieutenant Alexis Helmer, was killed, from the explosion of a German artillery shell. He died 102 years ago tomorrow, May 2, 1915.

Ypres a small, ancient Belgian town saw some of the most intense and sustained battles during the war. Helmer was serving in the same Canadian artillery unit as his friend, doctor and artillery commander Major John McCrae.

John McCrea

The son of Scottish immigrants, for McCrea, medicine, the Army and poetry were family traditions.

Thoughts on Veterans Day, 2016

A few years ago while working on the campus of the Veteran’s Hospital at American Lake near Tacoma, WA one of the regular staff there, despite my urgings to call me by my first name, refused. It was always “Mr. Gleason.”

When I brought it up at a staff meeting one afternoon, she explained she did it out of a deep-rooted respect for me and my service as a veteran. Her sincere remarks touched me in such a way that it brought tears to my eyes and another in the room later said they could tell I was deeply moved by what had been said. I understood her point of view, but I couldn’t help to think, what’s so special about what I did?

You see, I’ve never looked at my service in the Air Force as a sacrifice, nor was it, by any means, a selfless act. It was among the best years of my life and a tremendous opportunity.

It was a privilege to wear the uniform. I came away from those days and experiences so much more the benefactor. It was not a sacrifice to have served. To the contrary, the sacrifice would have been in not serving.

I was well-paid for those few years with a college education, job and mortgage assistance and even health care. More importantly, I was blessed beyond measure to have been born in this country. It’s the least I could do for it.

If I am a prideful person it’s for two reasons: I’m proud to have served in the military and I am a proud American.

I’m grateful in knowing that I served my country in a righteous cause. As a result I have a profound sense of patriotism and a love for country that touches me to the core. I rarely hear our National Anthem without choking with emotion. My thoughts turn to our flag and all that it represents, and especially to those who gave their lives to preserve freedom around the world providing us, and those less fortunate, with the freedom to choose.

So on this Veterans Day, while I salute all those who took the pledge and wore the uniform I remember those, from a personal perspective, who never returned to their homes and family.

The F-4 pilot who frequented our fire station for the “good food,” lost somewhere in the north. The F-105 pilot whose ejection seat malfuntioned killing him and another Air Force firefighter on my crew. And then there was a high school classmate, Robert Bolt Dickerson III, who joined the Marines and died in the Quang Nam Province of South Vietnam at the age of 18. There were a few others I knew and served with who paid the ultimate price but whose names I don’t now recall. Of course there are tens of thousands more from that era and from various wars and conflicts before and after. It is them I think of today. Any other “sacrifice” pales in comparison.

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A Letter to Friends and Citizens

A broadside of Washington’s Farewell Address, from the Rare Book and Special Collections Division of the Library of Congress

It came to be known as George Washington’s Farewell Address.  But it was never given as a speech. Distributed instead as a letter to the people of the United States it’s considered one of the most important documents in American history.

In his letter to “Friends and Citizens,” Washington devoted most of it to offer advice as a “parting friend” on what he believed were the greatest threats to the survival of a fledging nation. Among his subjects were foreign relations and free trade, credit and government borrowing as well as political factions and the party system. The letter is a masterpiece and, although written 218 years ago, his advice is worthy of our attention as it still governs much of our public affairs today. Just as Ronald Reagan did more recently George Washington looked ahead to the country’s future with great optimism.

American Exceptionalism: Is This a Great Country or What?

Objects of the most stupendous magnitude, and measure in which the lives and liberties of millions yet unborn are intimately interested, are now before us. We are in the very midst of a revolution the most complete, unexpected and remarkable of any in the history of nations. ~~ John Adams letter to William Cushing, June 9, 1776

I try to avoid writing about the political but from time to time it happens. Like most people I want to be liked. I want my words to bring smiles and pleasure. I want my stories bookmarked, remembered and my opinions respected. But I make no apologies about my occasional writings of the political kind. I just can’t help myself. Bad enough to hear it from outsiders but I get irked from time to time when I hear our own citizens tearing down our country. A lot has been said and written about American Exceptionalism, so time for me to write a little about it from my perspective, as well as an historical one.

Favorite Quotes Friday – 2/14/2014

This is dedicated to the memory of all the heroes. Not just those from my school days, and those from my days in the military during the Vietnam era, all who died too soon, but especially in remembrance of the nameless, forgotten ones. From wars and battles long past.

But to the hero, when his sword

Has won the battle for the free,

Thy voice sounds like a prophet’s word;

And in its hollow tones are heard

The thanks of millions yet to be.

~~ Marco Bozzaris, verse by Fitz-Greene Halleck, American Poet ~~

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D-Day – Taking the Moment

NOTE: This post was first published on June 6, 2013.

Today marks the 69th anniversary of D-Day, the Allied invasion of Europe at the Normandy beaches of northern France.  “To set free a suffering humanity” is how Franklin Roosevelt defined its purpose that evening. Earlier in the morning Supreme Allied Commander Dwight Eisenhower broadcast to the troops this message:

Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force! You are about to embark upon a great crusade…. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies … you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world. Your task will not be an easy one…. I have full confidence in your courage, devotion to duty and skill in battle…. Good Luck! And let us all beseech the blessings of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.

Among the young Americans who landed on Omaha Beach in the second assault wave was my uncle Eli Lines. Two days later, somewhere far from home in the French countryside, he would mark his 22nd birthday.

Eli & His Wife Mary circa 1945

But on June 6, 1944 as he fought his way ashore, fighting for his very survival — to reach dry, safer ground — left behind, he noted, were the bodies of hundreds of dead or dying Americans. The casualties at Omaha Beach alone would number in the thousands. He once told me, “the water was red with blood.” It was in fact the bloodiest battle in American history since the Civil War. The first 21-minutes of the 1998 movie Saving Private Ryan vividly depicts the chaos, the suffering, the inhumanity, the bravery. In reality it was far worse, much more difficult than portrayed. No movie could ever do that fight justice.

In 1945 when Eli returned home he like many of his fellow combat soldiers was a changed man, but no doubt a better man forged by unmentionable horror, suffering and sacrifice. One thing is certain, he lived a good and honorable life. My uncle is gone now and around 1000 World War II veterans die each day. Too soon the time will come when they’ll all be gone. But what they did and what they accomplished at those beaches and across Europe and throughout the Pacific — those young men of the Greatest Generation — should never be forgotten.

The Allied landing on the beaches at Normandy marked the beginning of the end of World War II — a conflict of such vast suffering as to defy comprehension. Pulitzer Prize winning author Rick Atkinson wrote: “This is the greatest catastrophe in human history. There’s 60 million people who die in World War II. It’s a death every three seconds for six years.” In his new book about the liberation of Europe, The Guns at Last Light, Atkinson quotes a German general who called the battle for Normandy “a monstrous blood mill.”

Let us never forget June 6, 1944 …

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Bradley Kritzer – An American Hero

Pfc. Bradley Kritzer

Today* would have been his 27th birthday. An all-American boy from small-town America. Bradley G. Kritzer, like many from the small boroughs of central Pennsylvania’s Clearfield county loved the outdoors and someday hoped to work there with an organization like the Pennsylvania Game Commission. Brad is a lot like many of my cousins with hunting and fishing a favorite pastime.  It is said that he grew up with a rifle in hand, hunting turkey and deer with his father and going fishing every chance he got. Brad is a distant cousin whose life I was drawn closer to by the tragedy of his death.