Focus On: Growing Up Military, WWII
Military Families’ and Civilians’ Reactions to Attack on Pearl Harbor
By: Walter Lord | December 6, 2011
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As the service families numbly adjusted to war, much of Honolulu carried on as usual. The people in close touch with the Army and Navy knew all too well by now; but for the thousands with little contact—or perhaps out of touch for the weekend—the world was still at peace.

People somehow ignored the most blatant hints. Second Lieutenant Earl Patton, off duty for the day, was out with friends in a chartered fishing boat when a plane plunged into the sea nearby. Assuming it was an accident, they headed for the spot to help the pilot. Then another plane swooped by, strafing them with machine guns. One of the party was even nicked, but Patton charitably assumed the second plane was just attracting their attention to the first. . . .

Back at the Star-Bulletin office, Editor Allen got a call from an exasperated policeman. Would he recall his newsboys—they might get hurt. They had gone to Pearl Harbor to sell their papers. . . .

Some people tuned in between bulletins, heard only a gospel service or the incidental music that was used to fill in. Reassured, they turned off their sets again. Others harked back to Orson Welles' broadcast of the Martian invasion . . . they weren't going to bite on this one.

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Focus On: Growing Up Military, Vietnam War
Julia Moore: Ia Drang and Family Notification
By: Kristen Henderson | November 17, 2011
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American soldiers and Marines had been dying in Vietnam in twos and threes when a battle erupted in an isolated valley called Ia Drang.

In a matter of days, more than 230 American soldiers were dead.

The sudden avalanche of casualty reports overwhelmed the Army’s notification system.

Taxi drivers were enlisted to deliver telegrams that began,

The Secretary of the Army regrets to inform you . . .
In the Georgia town where many of the wives lived near the Army post, word quickly spread about the taxi deliveries. The sight of a yellow cab pulling up in front of a house caused panic inside. [More...]
Focus On: Growing Up Military
Folded American Flag, The Flag and the Families, by Julia Spencer-Fleming
The Flag and the Families
By: Julia Spencer-Fleming | April 12, 2011
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You see them in long-range photos on the evening news and old black-and white pictures in books about Vietnam. They are iconic; the woman in a black dress, her heels sinking into the dirt that always seems softer around a new grave. The man in front of her is wearing a uniform so starched and polished you feel you could cut your fingers on the crease of his trousers, or be blinded by the sun off his brass. He is handing her an American flag, tightly folded so that only the blue star-spangled field shows. The other details vary: there may be a trumpeter, or a rifle volley. There may be four planes overhead, one arching away, lost in the sky. There may be motorcycle-riding angels and protestors. But there is always, always the uniformed man. And the woman. And the flag.

Mine is on an old chest of drawers in my bedroom. [More...]
Focus On: Growing Up Military
U.S. Troops and Holidays Away from Home
By: Charles W. Sasser | December 27, 2010
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Soldiers in close-knit units, which develop under the shared hardship and challenge of combat, tend to become families unto themselves. I was team medic for a U.S. Army Special Forces A-team when we found ourselves away from home and on mission one Christmas. That generally meant we worked and lived clandestine in the boondocks.

It snowed during the night. I awoke to a splendid sunrise. All around me were mounds, where soldiers wrapped in mummy bags and ponchos were sleeping underneath the snow. A deer among nearby conifers lifted her head. She continued to watch in astonishment, unmoving, as one by one soldiers shook off the snow, sat up, blinked and grinned at each other. A chorus of "Merry Christmas!" rang out through the trees. In many respects, we WERE home for Christmas. [More...]
Focus On: Growing Up Military
A Navy Family’s History of Service
By: P.T. Deutermann | December 7, 2010
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Navy families enjoy a special bond through the generations. You listen to your dad’s sea stories, or your older brother’s, and then, when you can finally tell some of your own, you become a member in good standing of an honorable American tradition reaching back to the eighteenth century. Your father can talk of pulling into Cavite in Manila Bay during the big war, and you can say, yeah, I stopped there when we were going out at night and hunting down pirates off Corregidor. My son can tell of flying his navy helicopter through a typhoon to rescue a Russian sailor who had a brain tumor. My daughter flew in F-14’s and can tell stories about being at Top Gun school. Not many families can sit around the dinner table and do that. [More...]
Focus On: Growing Up Military
Vietnam Memorial
One Wife’s Memory of Ia Drang
By: Nancy Edwards | November 15, 2010
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For a week following the battles of Ia Drang, Nancy Edwards thought her husband, Bob Edwards, had been killed. She describes learning about the battle, the call from the Red Cross a week later, and the events that followed. [More...]
Focus On: Growing Up Military
Taken for Granted No More
By: Christina Olds | November 11, 2010
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What would Brigadier General Robin Olds want us to remember on Veteran's Day? In the early mornings of 1962, before my sister and I left for school, our tall, handsome father, in his Air Force dress blues, would kiss us goodbye, leaving traces of Old Spice on our cheeks, and then he’d head off to his job at the Pentagon. We didn’t have a clue what he did there. [More...]
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