Ken Burn's Documentary on WW II

My wife and I have been transfixed over the past several nights watching Ken Burn's series about World War II being shown this week on WUNC. I know that I should have spent these hours working on the campaign but for those of my generation the stories being told are too compelling to ignore. And yet I get a sense from the younger generation and that includes my own children, that WW II is just ancient history and the temptation to spend the evening watching baseball or movies or sitcoms is much more appealing. My question is: who is watching? I haven't talked with anyone this week who's tuned in and frankly, that's simply unacceptable.

As the first of the baby boomers I grew up only a few years removed from WW II. My Dad enlisted at the age of 36 and spent his two years training troops at Ft. Bragg. Mom refusing to be left home alone, joined the Red Cross and spent two years at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana and Camp Butner near Durham working with soldiers both returning from combat and those headed to the war. My Mom's brother hit the beaches in North Africa and then on to Italy. He was a tough character, chain smoking, whiskey drinking, a swaggering figure as I knew him growing up. My Mom's scrapbook contains letters from "somewhere in Italy" or letters from a friend in the Pacific fighting the Japanese and other memories from that period. My wife's Dad spent six years training artillery troops and was waiting to be part of the invasion of Japan. His brother Sam, a pilot, was killed in a training accident.

The heroes of my home town were the men and women of WWII. The movies I watched, the early TV shows of the 1950's, the stories I heard around the kitchen table or a camp fire on weekend picnics reinforced the magnitude of their accomplishments and the sacrifices they made. Perhaps this was brought home most poignantly to me shortly after the Army sent me to Germany in 1969. It was a far different environment from my impressions of wartime Europe and I found it hard to reconcile the friendly atmosphere with my images of the war. That changed a few weeks later as I sat quietly at the American Military Cemetery in Margraaten, Holland. In front of me stood row upon row of white crosses and stars of David marking the burial site of thousands of young Americans who had left home to fight for their country and gave their lives in defense of our freedoms. Hundreds of Dutch citizens came that Memorial Day to place flowers on the graves of each soldier. "Why do you come?" I asked a grizzled old fellow. "I come because these soldiers freed my country." he quietly answered.

And that's why everyone ought to be watching tonight and saying a quiet prayer in gratitude for Babe, and Walter Ehlers and all those who gave their lives for the freedom and prosperity we enjoy today.