OT: Wishing all a Memorable Memorial Day - Including a Video Tribute

[Alaskawildkat]

Wishing all a memorable Memorial Day as we reflect upon the lives of those who gave so much to us in life and who continue to inspire us. This Sunday morning the offered lesson was from a talk by a former airlines pilot. He prefaced his remarks by making reference to Orville and Wilbur Wright's father's first airplane flight as he called out to his son, "Higher, higher." He continued, "I know something of what the Wrights felt. I too have 'slipped the surly bonds of Earth and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings.'"

The reference to that brief refrain brought back memories of hearing those same words on the late night TV sign offs that were once a part of the television experience back in the 1960s and 1970s. Each night one would see on the TV screen fighter jets in flight accompanied by a reading of the poem "HIgh Flight" before the night's programming would come to an end. Here first is a link to that "sign off."
It is followed by a link to a just created YouTube Playlist titled, "A Tribute to those who Serve and Have Served" that I have just assembled from a sequence of my own videos that I have just posted to my YouTube Channel for this Memorial Day. In the first two video clips I have attempted to replicate the jets seen flying in the archived "Sign Off."


https://forums.collectors.com/home/...t=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qx3WueJWlb4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qx3WueJWlb4


A TRIBUTE TO THOSE WHO SERVE AND HAVE SERVED

In 1941 a World War II pilot penned a poem in a letter to his parents which has come to be known as "High Flight." The letter arrived a week after he was killed in action. In the closing line of that poem he wrote, "... I've trod the high untrespassed sanctity of space, put out my hand, and touched the face of God."

As a youth in the 60s and 70s I well recall on the late night television signing off sequence, hearing those words of that poem as it was read along with views of fighter jets veering into space.

This Playlist pays homage to that airman as representative of the many Veterans who have served their country. First are two clips of fighter jets in the skies followed by a bugle call playing Taps at a National Cemetery in Alaska. It concludes with a winter view of that cemetery as it is surrounded by the beauty of frosted trees and brightened by a crossed star of sunlight.

First Video in below linked Playlist:

After a Four Year absence, an Aerial Demonstration Team returned to perform in Alaska at Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson. Watch as this quartet of United States Air Force Thunderbirds propel upward in formation into the Alaska Sky in their most recent return on July 31, 2022.

Second Video in below linked Playlist:

Returned to Alaska one of the USAF Flight Demonstration Team members pilots his F-16 Fighter Jet horizontally just over the heads of the gathered spectators attending the first, and most recent, Arctic Thunder Open House since 2018 held at Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson in Alaska.

Third Video in below linked Playlist:

On an early January mid-winter day a World War II Veteran is remembered and honored at the Fort Richardson National Cemetery in Alaska. The Flag is lifted and the bugler plays Taps.

Fourth Video in below linked Playlist:

The final resting place for many who served their country (including my own father) and now established as a National Cemetery since 1984, Fort Richardson National Cemetery is viewed here in its winter serenity. As the camera pans the snow topped head stones a crossed star of light appears as if offering an expression of thanks for the service of those interred here. (Among others buried here is President Teddy Roosevelt's son Kermit who was a Major in the Army during World War II.)

And here is the link to the Playlist. Click on the hyperlink rather than the screen shot to see the full Playlist. Otherwise you will just see the first video in the Playlist.

 

[No Chores]

Thank you my Alaska friend. Great way to start my Memorial Day weekend. My wife and I are going to Paris and Normandy this summer, and I'm sure Normandy will be a very emotional experience. Paris is just for fun between the Olympics and the Special Olympics.

 

[stpaulcat]

Thank you for posting this. In retrospect, life in the military is another world, in some ways like the one most of us live in, but the stakes are higher in terms of outcomes. In our particular time, we should keep in mind what these brave individuals fought for and do the same at the ballot box this November.

 

[WestCoastWildcat]

Thanks for sharing, Alaska. My parents are interred at the Fort Rosescrans military cemetery on the Point Loma peninsula. It’s a very scenic place on the same road that also takes you to the Cabrillo National Monument that overlooks San Diego harbor and downtown. A must-see if you are visiting from out of town.

My dad was a WWII vet having served in the Army Air Force as a ball turret gunner who flew on a B-17 bomber during campaigns over Italy and Germany during WWII. If your group survived a certain number of missions you were sent home. As his position was underneath the plane as a ball turret gunner he was particularly vulnerable. I’ve seen a B-17 a few times in person at different museums and air shows, just haven’t had the courage to go up and fly in one when it was possible for a fee. I am amazed that my dad was able to have spent long periods in such a cramped space of the ball turret. We just can’t comprehend what our military went thru on land, air and sea. It’s a good time for us to reflect on their sacrifices as they continue to this day.

 

[Alaskawildkat]

My dad was a WWII vet having served in the Army Air Force as a ball turret gunner who flew on a B-17 bomber during campaigns over Italy and Germany during WWII. If your group survived a certain number of missions you were sent home. As his position was underneath the plane as a ball turret gunner he was particularly vulnerable. I’ve seen a B-17 a few times in person at different museums and air shows, just haven’t had the courage to go up and fly in one when it was possible for a fee. I am amazed that my dad was able to have spent long periods in such a cramped space of the ball turret. We just can’t comprehend what our military went thru on land, air and sea. It’s a good time for us to reflect on their sacrifices as they continue to this day.

Your dad was in good company. Our own Charleton Heston served as a gunner here in Alaska during World War II:

OK, and for a Northwestern connection, I learned from a book for sale at the Alaska Veterans Museum that our own Charlton Heston was himself an Alaska Veteran, having served in Alaska during World War II as a radio operator and gunner with the U.S. Army Airforces after having completed his education at Northwestern and then joining the war effort in 1944.

(Heston was born in No Mans Land, Illinois in the early 1920s as John Charles Carter. He attended High School in Evanston where his having auditioned for a play on a whim ended up in garnering him a scholarship from Northwestern. His wife was a coed at Northwestern whom he married in 1944, the same year he enlisted, and they eventually had two children. His professional acting career began after his military service in 1946 when he and his wife moved to New York. He died in 2008.)

This from the Imdb bio:

In 1944, Heston enlisted in the United States Army Air Forces. He served for two years as a radio operator and aerial gunner aboard a B-25 Mitchell stationed in the Alaskan Aleutian Islands with the 77th Bombardment Squadron of the Eleventh Air Force. He reached the rank of Staff Sergeant. Heston married Northwestern University student Lydia Marie Clarke, who was six months his senior. That same year he joined the military.

And this from the book I found at the Alaska Veterans Museum:

I guess it is apropos that the man who went on to head the National Rifle Association served his country as a "gunner."