A clean pride in our fallen heroes

As we head into the Memorial Day weekend, let us not forget what Memorial Day is all about.

To get you in the mood, may I recommend this piece. I know all Las Vegans striving for completeness will enjoy it.

It begins: "When I was a kid we called it Decoration Day ..."

It ends: "When the salute has been fired and 'Taps' played and it's all over, we always leave with a deeper gratitude for our freedom, with a clean pride in a country that has spilled so much of its blood for others, and with a heartfelt awe of those ordinary men and women who have risen at every moment of crisis and have laid down their lives to defend and preserve this beacon, this exceptional wonderment of human history, the United States of America."

The writing in between, I promise you, is well worth your time.

PS: This note from a reader of The Complete Las Vegan came in and I thought it worth sharing:

May 27, 2011

Dear Mr. Fredrick.

Thanks for your recent blog regarding Memorial day. It got me to recall memories that had faded and then lead me to dig up my copy of Ernie's War, a compilation of Ernie Pyle's dispatches from the Second World War during 1942 to 1945.

He covered the war from fox holes shared with kids who were not unlike my uncles, all of whom returned home. Uncle, Emil steered those little landing crafts that carried soldiers and marines to those unfriendly shores in the Pacific, Uncle Frank walked the frozen German countryside with Patton to Bastogne, Uncle Glenn (who recently passed away) landed at Normandy D Day +7 seeking the liberation of the French port of Cherbourg, and Uncle Al was an 18 year old who enlisted shortly after graduating high school , trained 6 months with the Marine's and landed on Saipan's shore. He was hit by morter shell fragments, wounded with a severe leg injury and spent the next 36 hours huddled in a shell hole waiting for a lull in the fighting so he could be evacuated to the ship hospital. The next 9 months were at a hospital in Hawaii.

All Uncles talked little of the war and less of their actual involvement.

These tidbits I mention were gleaned over many years in simple short comments that slipped out. I never understood the reticence to talk until I read, Ernie's January 10, 1944 war dispatch that dealt with the death of his friend Captain Waskow. In telling of the caravan of dead soldiers being trekked down the from the mountainous battle location he wrote," I don't know who that first one was. You feel small in the presence of a dead man and ashamed at being alive, and you don't ask silly questions."

Blessedly, the window flag that flew from my Grandmother's house had four blue stars. No gold stars which would have indicated the loss of a family member. She was from Lithuania and spoke good but broken English. Grandma was a no nonsense women, with an indomitable spirit. After working days cleaning equipment at a local bread company she would frequently take the street car to the Chicago downtown USO and help in any way she could.

While traveling in Germany one year, we stayed in a small hamlet and attended Sunday church services. Outside the small Catholic church was a statue of three soldiers in military uniform with dates indicating a WW I memorial. A local church member was kind and translated the monument's attached plaque. It was a simple message mourning the loss of the village's sons in WWI. To me this confirmed that mothers all over the world cry in common over the loss of their sons in war.

Another trip found us in Bayeux, France, which is situated very near the beaches where the Normandy landing of June 6, 1944 occurred. Some 35 years after the Allies landed at the beaches my wife and I stood there at daybreak I picked up a couple of pebbles off the beach, thinking I would take them home as a memento. But, I quickly put them back realizing I had no right to a memento from this beach and that to take them would have somehow diminished what was sacrificed on that beach.

Later in the day we went to the American cemetery which in suituated on a bluff that overlooks Omaha beach. Scattered among the thousands of white marble grave markers were men whose age I have now attained. Some stared at a particular marker, other gazed at the enormity of the graves site and others stood at attention and saluted. All stood silently. And we did what they all were doing, .....we cried.

Thank you for helping me to recall these memories. I am indebted to you.

Alden E Smith
Henderson, NV