… We both got the Cross the same day, but what he did made mine look cheap. “But, Johnny, at Iwo I served under the bravest man I ever knew. Bad thing about getting shot up on a mountain is guys getting shot hauling you down. “Yeah, yeah … I got shot square in the bottom, and they gave me the Cross for securing a hot spot about halfway up Suribachi. When Carson asked Marvin about his Marine experience as one who was there during the initial landing at Iwo, Marvin responded. ![]() While I’m not sure I believed him, it made for something he always embraced, a great story.Ī little nosing around online kicked up a few stories of those who served with distinction and about whom yesterday was all about.ĭuring a time when many Hollywood stars who served in the military were essentially PR figures, actor Lee Marvin fought at Iwo Jima and was awarded the Navy Cross, which is second only to the Medal of Honor.īut it was a story he told Johnny Carson on “The Tonight Show” that really intrigued me about someone he knew well during his military time, someone that was an integral part of my childhood. The uniform, my father would say, he won in a craps game while on leave. His dress blues hung in the front closet of our living room in the ranch bearing the Latham Avenue numbers 1525, a uniform that remained in a clear dry-cleaning bag all the way to one of the saddest days I will ever endure back in 1978 when he was killed in a car-train accident. ![]() I think of my father, a Parris Island-trained Marine who served as a Master Tech Sergeant. 11 and allow that day to be the exclusive domain of those for whom I am grateful. So, each year, Veterans Day prompts some guilt in me, as I think it does with all who never accepted without question the mandates of a superior officer.Īs I do each year, I respectfully stand to the side each Nov. Thanks to the good fortune of being born into a family that could afford to send me to college and the 2-S deferment that came with it and a fortuitous draft lottery number (169), I wasn’t drafted and never knew what it was like to wear the uniform so many have worn so proudly. It certainly wasn’t meant for me, a child who came of age in the late 1960s when the very last place I wanted to be was in Vietnam. ![]() Thanksgiving and Independence Day are for all of us. It’s really a day reserved for only some. 11 to honor, as he put it, “with solemn pride … the heroism of those who died in the country’s service” during World War I.Īnd while the name of the holiday and its scope eventually changed to Veterans Day as a day to honor all veterans, the uniqueness is, of course, just that. Veterans Day traces its roots to 1919 when President Woodrow Wilson made a proclamation establishing Armistice Day for Nov. Yesterday was rather unique when it comes to holidays.
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