DT/CC -
June 6 1944 - I was 7 mos. old and learning to be a good listener according to my mom. It all came in very handy later in life as I found out what friends and family did before, during and after that fateful day: We had a neighbor just over our back fence who'd involuntarily flinch, tightening his shoulders when a car backfired or the kids up the block threw a cherry bomb too close on the 4th of July. Turns out he jumped into St. Mere Eglise with the 82nd Airborne the night before the Allies went ashore at Normandy. My dad had a cousin who took one through the knee on the beach at Anzio when Patton took Sicily. Had an uncle whose B-24 Liberator made it through 8 missions before flak and fighters took her down over Magdeburg in September of '43. He spent the remainder of the war at Stalag Luft 4 in Pomerania near Gross Tychow (now Poland)and was one of the very first to see the new ME 262 jet fighters being tested on an adjacent airfield. Liberated by the Russians advancing westward to Berlin in May of '45, they walked out with them to freedom. Worked for a time with a man who served on a gun crew on a destroyer in the Pacific that drew picket line position # 19 North the night before the massive kamikaze assault at Okinawa. All things I like to think about when I'm griping about a "tough day at the office." KBM