By Suzanne Rice

     Growing up in the 1950’s in a small town in Southern Illinois, I was surrounded by my father’s friends, all of whom served in the military in WWII. It was a very patriotic place with speeches on Memorial Day and the Fourth of July and summer concerts by the High School band with all kinds of patriotic music. My father’s best childhood friend became the town’s most admired lawyer, and it was often Jim Wham who gave the rousing speeches when we all gathered at our Carnegie Library near the bandshell that was home of the summer concerts.  As a child, I thought of Jim as eloquent as Abraham Lincoln – a twentieth century statesman.

    My hometown has three distinctions. The first was the tragic mine explosion that occurred on Good Friday in 1947. It was the worst mine explosion ever in the USA. 111 of the men working there died on that terrible day; one of them was my grandfather who started working in the mine at 13. In the years since then, he had risen to be a foreman. He died along with his men on that day. The tragedy touched the whole town – among the victims were brothers, cousins and friends. I never met my grandfather; I was born nine months after the explosion. Soon after hearing about the explosion, Woody Guthrie memorialized the tragedy in three songs, “Waiting at the Gate”, “The Dying Miner” and “Talking Centralia” Some miners left messages to their families on which he based his songs.

      The next distinction was that the whole town loved high school basketball. Throughout the decades, the team members were the stars in town, and everyone knew their names. For many years the team was led by a well-loved coach who taught the town’s young men teamwork, good values and the thirst to work hard to win. So much so that our team, the Orphans, became the winningest high school team across the whole United States. They won several state championships and got close several times throughout the whole of the 20^th century. Recently, the Orphan mascot was voted the most unusual mascot across the entire U.S.

Lastly, we were surprised to find in 1960 that the US Census proclaimed that Centralia, Illinois was the Center of Population for the USA.         

     (Coincidently, just as I was writing about the three distinctions of my hometown, I received a series of texts from my younger brother who just happened to find some interesting information. I want to share the fourth distinction that was news to us both – way before our time! It seems that Centralia, founded in 1853, was the site of the Illinois State Fair in 1858. Both Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas stopped by the fair as they traveled between campaign stops. But it wasn’t the famous Senate candidates at the Fair that got the attention. Centralia Attracts Abraham Lincoln and Hot Air Balloons in 1858 — The Greater Centralia Chamber of Commerce  )

       As a child, I never thought of my earlier ancestors or when they might have come to the USA. That is until one of my mother’s brothers (there were six brothers and four sisters raised just outside town on a farm during the Depression.) did some genealogy work and shared it with me. If I ever had thought of those ancestors, I assumed that they were new immigrants like the many European folks in town, mostly those with Italian and German names. Didn’t really think about it – they were just my friends; never wondered where they came from or how long they had been here.

       You can imagine my surprise when my uncle sent our family tree. He found ancestors that had been brave and adventurous like all of our ancestors since most of us are descended from immigrants. I was amazed to find out that on every side of my family tree there were people who braved great odds to come to the New World. One part of the family arrived on the Ark and were among the first Catholics to leave England to settle the new Maryland colony. They arrived in the new world on March 25, 1634. The colonists made friends with the Piscataway and Yoacamato Indians who gave some of their land to establish the first Maryland village they called St. Mary’s. March 25 is still celebrated in the State of Maryland as Maryland Day. Generations later, the same family braved the wilderness to settle the Kentucky frontier and set up the first of Kentucky’s distilleries – have you heard of Old Granddad’s? He is my granddad! (News to me!)

     My uncle discovered that some ancestors arrived in New Amsterdam (later New York) in 1651 settling in Breucklijn (later Brooklyn) from Holland. Somehow or other, they eventually braved the difficult conditions moving to New Jersey and then continued West to southern Illinois. One ancestor in the North Carolina colony was forced west after his plantation was burned by the British in the War of 1812. He became the first schoolmaster in Marion County, Illinois – that was a long, arduous journey of 700 miles for him and his large family.

      Like your family, whether they arrived recently or centuries ago, the U.S.A gave them and us opportunities we would have never had anywhere else. For that I am grateful and appreciate the hard struggles they suffered to give us the “land of the free and the home of the brave.” Let us protect it and honor their legacy forever. God bless America.

We know and hold in high esteem, the early leaders of the U.S. Army who fought so valiantly for our freedom. George Washington, Nathanael Green, Henry Knox, Ethan Allen. We have been taught about heroes of later years: Andrew Jackson, Winfield Scott in the War of 1812; Zachary Taylor in the Mexican War, dozens of heroes of the Civil War; Walter Reed and Leonard Wood of the Spanish-American War; in WWI, John J. Pershing, Edwin Hubble; Dwight Eisenhower, Audie Murphy and many more who served in WWII; Douglas MacArthur in Korea, Creighton Abrams among many others in the Vietnam War, Norman Schwartzkopf in the Iraq War and many heroes from the years in Afghanistan. I would like to make my tribute to those millions of soldiers who served under/with our famous heroes – the ones we don’t know by name. They were heroes – all – because they were willing to give their lives to protect us and our way of life. Many were our fathers, husbands, sons, brothers, sisters. Along with the hundreds of thousands of nameless patriots, we should remember all of the families that supported, encouraged and waited for their own personal hero. Sometimes, it was hard, but hard builds character and those who have been associated with our Army, its leaders and its values (https://thedaysforward.com/framing-the-army-of-the-future-1995/ ) have contributed to our country during their service to our country and for most in their lives after serving. Their strong and patriotic essence is the backbone of our land, for they continue to make their communities better because of their love of country and for the values that they internalized and are passing on to the next generation. Having been associated with these folks for many years has been the most unique and enriching experience and I salute you all!

It was a dreary summer morning in July. I was out early for my daily walk before it got too hot to be outside. I headed to the city hall/library complex to walk and to return a CD to the library. As I approached, I first saw some caution tape near the city flagpole. What is happening here on a random Saturday morning in July? It isn’t Fourth of July or Flag Day, Memorial Day or Veterans’ Day. What is it that they are commemorating on July 27?  As I got closer, I noticed that the men had VFW hats on their heads. Still couldn’t figure out what they might be remembering.

    I went about getting my steps in for the day while thinking it was none of my business what they were doing there early on a Saturday morning. I couldn’t help myself; I had to find out, so I walked a little closer and got there just as their ceremony was finishing. I noticed someone I knew. He is a deacon at our church. I walked up to him and asked what they were doing. With a bright smile of pride on his face he said, “Today is the seventy-first anniversary of the end of the Korea War.”

They were all veterans of the Korean War, and they were there to remember their fallen friends and commemorate their service to our country. They didn’t have to know each other from their days in Korea, but they were brothers in patriotism for their country.

      I hadn’t finished my walk so I left his side wishing that I had asked sooner because I would have liked to join in their memorial to their fallen friends and their service. I spent the rest of my walk thinking of my own time in Korea and my connection to these wonderful veterans, most of them in their mid-90’s. Having lived in Korea for almost a year while my husband was assigned to the Second Infantry Division 1973-74, twenty years after the end of the Korean War, I had a special place in my heart for them. Had I known about their ceremony, I might have shared with them what Korea was like 20 years after their service there. Too bad.

     I was three years old when the Korean War started and wasn’t aware of what was going on across the world. It did come into focus when I got to first grade. One of my classmates had intimate knowledge of the Korean War. Her father was a veteran fighter pilot from World War II. In fact, her parents met in France when her mother was an Army nurse there. In Korea, he was flying a B-26B Invader with the 13^th Bomber Squadron, 3^rd Bomber Group over North Korea. He was killed on a night intruder mission and presumed dead on February 28,1954, having been shot down on August 10, 1952. Can you imagine the pain for that little family in a small Midwestern farm town as they waited for news? My friend was only six years old and her younger sister just three when news of their father was official. It was a sadness their friends helped his family carry for many years.

      The presence of the men at the flagpole also reminded me of before I got on the plane to fly unauthorized to Korea in June 1973. Before I left my hometown (same Midwestern town), one of the teachers at the high school where I was teaching while Bill was in Korea came up to me and said he had heard I was leaving for Korea at the end of the school year. He said he was a veteran of the Korean War and told me a little about his wartime experiences. He showed me a couple of black and white photos of his war-time experience – several of them near the Deoksugung Palace. They showed the devastation of war, just what he had encountered. He asked me to go to the Deoksugung Palace while I was in Korea so that I could tell him about it when I returned; he described it as on the outskirts of the capital, Seoul. Those were my only instructions.

           

By the time I got there in 1973, the Palace was in the middle of Seoul, a bustling, modern capital. Like many who served in the Korean War, he had not spoken much about his service, but he was proud of answering the call of his country.

     I had a unique year in Korea (other stories may be found here on thedayforward). It was nothing like the years of the Korean War, but also nothing like I had experienced at home in the U.S. or in Germany. It was still, twenty years after the War, a more primitive place with dirt roads, open-air markets and only a little Western influence. Kimchi was made in each home in large clay vats kept on the roof to “marinate” in the sun for months before it was ready to eat. Kimchee along with rice were staples of the Korean diet and each family had their own recipe. There was no central heating; instead, most houses used large charcoal blocks for heating the floor (ondol heating). No indoor plumbing. There were few personal automobiles; no soldiers had a personal vehicle. To get anywhere, we had to hail a “kimchee cab” or get on the bus. Yet, Korea was not at war and American soldiers were still there at the DMZ as well as scattered on posts all throughout the country to keep the peace. These were successors-brothers of the men near the flagpole on that July morning.

     Forty years later, our son, also a field artilleryman, was stationed in Korea. Oddly enough, he was assigned to the same battalion in which his father had served those many years before. In the intervening years, 1/15 FA had moved nearer the DMZ at Camp Casey/Hovey. After he got to Korea, I asked him to go visit the family in whose home I had lived in 1973-74. Things had changed even more spectacularly than in the twenty years between the Korean War and my own time there. When I suggested a trip to Ui Jong Bu to visit our friends, he replied, “I’m sure they are not there, anymore.”  In place of the small, family homes surrounding the open-air market (not far from Camp Red Cloud), had grown an 11-story shopping mall. Underneath the mall was a high-speed rail line going from Dongducheon (Camp Casey) to Seoul. (While I was there in the 1970’s, the bus from Ui Jong Bu to Seoul took one hour – from Camp Casey add another hour.)  On their high-speed rail, it took only 15 minutes from Camp Casey to Seoul!

      The world in Korea had changed in those years and was now modern. Thanks go to the men at the flagpole on the dreary morning in July. Their love of our Country and their willingness to sacrifice brought better times for the South Korean people. Remembering and commemorating those they lost in combat was important to them 71 years later. (36,634 brave Americans gave their lives because their country asked them to serve in Korea.) It is often called “The Forgotten War”, but on this cloudy Saturday, it was not forgotten – their service will always live in the hearts of these patriots. God bless them.

Thank a soldier.

Editors note: The Korean War Veterans Memorial is located in Washington, D.C. southeast of the Lincoln Memorial. It is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It depicts a company of soldiers in the Korean War. It was dedicated in 1995. From my experience living in Korea for almost a year, through a hot summer and a frigid winter, it was a terrible place for a war (Is there a good place?). The summers are oppressively hot and humid (no air conditioning in 1973 or 1953); the winters were terribly cold. When Bill was pay officer, he had to drive in an open jeep from 4P1 (a forward operating base near the DMZ where a battery would be at all times to counter any invasion from the North) to Camp Stanley (about 20 miles) to get cash to pay his soldiers. It was 35 degrees below zero for that trip – he was almost frozen when he got to Ui Jong Bu – then, he had to drive back! At the Memorial, you will see the soldiers in all their gear. They needed every layer to survive the frigid weather. Go see the Memorial next time you are in D.C. https://www.nps.gov/kowa/kowahome.htm

To read part 1, go here first.

November 12, 2016 Near Atlanta, GA

      A friend’s husband was going to be out of town, and she asked me to spend the weekend with her. We had been friends for several decades and it was a chance for us to have some quality time together. I was delighted to have the opportunity.  I was at her house when I woke up on Saturday, 12 November 2016. Our son, Christopher, had been stationed at Bagram Air Force Base but was leaving Afghanistan with his unit on that day after his second tour to that war zone. The whole family was delighted that he would soon be back at Ft. Carson. It would be several days before he would land in the US after leaving Afghanistan.

     When I woke up, I reached for my phone to check the time (oh, too early!). It was 4 a.m. in Atlanta. Since it was so early, I took a look at the newsfeed on my phone. Oh, my gosh! Oh, no! The title of the first article was “Terrorist Attack at Bagram Air Force Base”. What? How could that be? Bagram was thought of as the safest post in the war zone. I was horrified, worried and immediately fully awake. What do I do next? It was too early to wake up my friend to tell her. Instead, full of worry, I got up, dressed, repacked my overnight bag and got ready for the day, still pondering what I ought to do.

      Having been around the military for several decades by this time as an Army wife and later, an Army mom, I knew that when there was some sort of tragedy in the military, all personal communication would stop and only a military spokesman would be giving out information. The theory was that the next of kin of those injured or killed would need to be contacted before the full story would go out to the public. That also gave the military time to investigate the situation. This also kept rumors from flying around. It might take a day or so to contact the next of kin. Oh…that is me.

     At six o’clock, I decided that I needed to get home as fast as possible. How could any Army representative get in touch with me if I wasn’t home? I woke up my friend and told her the situation. She was shocked, horrified and concerned. Our church has overnight Adoration on Fridays and into Saturday morning; since it was the six a.m. hour, I decided I would have time for a few minutes of prayer before anyone would come to my house to tell me the fate of our son. I was a little shaky, but since my friend lives close to church, it didn’t take me long to drive over where I found another friend there praying. I asked her to keep Christopher in her prayers. She knew him from a child and was happy to be in prayer for him, but shocked and concerned about his fate.

      Then, I rushed home where I tried to get my mind off the situation in Afghanistan, though I did check the news, but found nothing; it was all I could think of – why wasn’t there news? Where was Christopher? What had happened? Was there any additional news?  Flip on the television, again. No additional info just the Alert that there was a terrorist attack at Bagram. How can I keep my mind occupied? Should I call other family members – or will they just worry like me? I tried to keep the worry to myself, when I realized I needed to get people praying for the victims. I called Christopher’s sisters in MD and then, went back to my personal worrying.

      At about noon, out of the blue, came a call from one of my husband’s West Point classmates. I don’t believe he had ever called me before and I don’t remember now what he had planned to talk about, but in the midst of whatever it was, he asked about Christopher. “Thank you for asking…you’ll never believe what is going on.” He hadn’t heard about the attack. He reassured me that he would keep Christopher, his men and the soldiers/airmen at Bagram AFB in his prayers. I believe God inspired his call to me to reassure me.

     I was well aware that I would not hear from Christopher for some time, if ever again. What I didn’t know was where he might be. Would he still leave Afghanistan? Was he injured? Was he alive? It was hard to think of those things, but I needed to be prepared. I had to think how I would handle each of those possibilities. Among all those thoughts, I kept looking out the window to see if I would see the dreaded Army vehicle on my street.

      It was a very long Saturday – no matter that it started at 4 a.m. It was the uncertainty of the situation. Should I pack a bag to get to Ramstein, Germany where badly injured soldiers would be taken? There wasn’t much information from news outlets. All I could do was wonder and try to figure out how I would handle the situations that might confront me and my daughters. All I knew for sure was that I needed to stay home until more information came my way, so that is what I did. Eventually, since the day had gone by without any personal news, I had to give up and try to sleep. It was hard to put the difficult thoughts to bed even when I was in bed myself.

      Sunday morning came and there still was no communication from Christopher or anyone. Eventually, I learned from the media what had happened. At 5:30 a.m. that Saturday morning in Afghanistan, a group of more than 100 soldiers and American contractors had gathered for a Veterans’ Day run. At about 5:38 a.m., a man approached the group and detonated a suicide vest killing two soldiers and two contractors, injuring 16 Americans and 1 Polish national. How in the world did a terrorist get into Bagram? Later investigation revealed that the terrorist had worked for an American contractor and had been making a suicide vest for some time. What a terrible tragedy. At this point, however, I still had no idea whether Christopher and his soldiers might have been a part of the group celebrating Veterans’ Day 2016.

      I tried to compose myself that morning, still trying to figure out what I ought to be doing besides continuing to pray. Should I leave home to go to Sunday Church or must I stay home? Later, that morning, the phone rang. “Mom? I’m OK. We’re in Kuwait. I can’t talk now, but I’ll tell you more when I get back home.” He told me later what a strange, chaotic day it was as his unit tried to understand what had happened and what they ought to do. At the sound of the blast, those assigned to Bagram Airfield immediately donned their full battle gear not knowing what terrorist activity had caused the blast across the flight line. In the transient quarters, the remaining members of Task Force Red Warrior realized they had no battle gear – no means of personal protection. In the hubbub of trying to figure out what was going on, they discovered their only immediate defense – one soldier still had his firearm; their unit’s defense was, oddly enough, the chaplain’s assistant.

     Now, I could breathe again, but immediately, my mind went to the other mothers and families who didn’t get the good news I received. My prayers went out to them; I had suffered right along with them, but their news was devastating. Gold Star families suffer each day with the loss of their brave service members.

We must keep them in our prayers.