A Veteran's Legacy

I've been on a bit of a soap box this week.  I'm actually really upset with the State of Illinois, Cook County, the Village of Oak Park, and school districts 97 and 200.  Today is Veteran's Day, but my kids are in school, and most public services are running as usual.  Someone somewhere decided that, for the sake of "convenience," Veteran's Day should be observed on Monday this year, to give people the benefit of a three-day weekend.  Excuse me, but I think this is really awful.  Our servicemen and women sacrifice tremendously in order to bravely serve this country. 

I think of how much Baird's dad and his family sacrificed.  Baird's granddaddy watched his only son, Ira Warren Shattuck III (Warren), march off to war.  Warren was a tail gunner with the Army Air Corps (before there was an Air Force) in World War II.  Those planes flew thru fog without radar, and the men in the planes were terrified each and every time they went up.  I was surprised to learn that when I read Warren's flight log and journal.  He very vividly wrote about the raw fear that gripped him before and during every mission.

On his seventh bombing mission over Germany, Warren's plane was shot down.  When the navigator let the pilot know they were very close to the German/Swiss boarder, the pilot did everything he could possibly do to land that broken plane in Switzerland, and he succeeded.  So, instead of being held as prisoners of war in Germany, they were "detained" in Switzerland.  They were held in a hotel, and were not allowed to leave the country.  They were, however, allowed to send one telegram to their parents.

When Baird's granddaddy received the telegram that Warren's plane had been shot down, he went into shock and had a nervous breakdown. The idea that his only child might not survive the war just about did him in. Finally, Warren was able to get a telegram to his parents to let them know he had survived the plane crash, and was being held in Switzerland.  We still have that telegram.

Warren was able to escape, and with the help of the French Underground, he quite literally walked across war-torn Europe.  He hid in forests and swamps and suffered frost bite.  He made his way to England, and then back to the United States.  He spent the remainder of the war traveling across the US, training the pilots and plane crews that were about to be shipped out to the European front.  He had just received his orders for the Pacific Theater when the U.S. dropped the bombs on Japan, ending the Second World War.

Warren came thru the war in better shape than a lot of guys, but it affected him in ways big and small.  I never got the full story, but he hated rats, and it had something to do with being held in that hotel in Switzerland.  He suffered from survivor's guilt.  But there were good things too:  he went to college on the GI Bill, and that's where he met Bernie, Baird's mom.

Whenever I look at the telegram sent by Warren to his dad, I'm reminded of the sacrifice military families make. It's huge. The very least we can do is pause and say thanks on the actual day designated as Veteran's Day.