Honor Their Service - Grandparents.com

On Memorial Day, children and grandchildren should hear the stories of grandparents who served.

They use words and phrases like "C-rations" and "Rosie the Riveter"; "SNAFU," "D-Day," and "38th Parallel"; "police action," "Nam," and "Charlie"; and "Desert Storm" and "Scud missile."

They reference these people, places, and events with pride and sadness, all at once. And we listen, intently, reverently, because they know. Our grandparents, men and women alike, know about war.

With U.S. soldiers fighting in Iraq for a sixth-consecutive Memorial Day, the holiday reminds us to pause and honor the memories of our grandparents. Because if anybody understands the reality of war, it is they.

Michael Stavola knows about war. He was an Air Force pilot during the Vietnam War. His grandfather fought in Europe during World War I. His father served in the Pacific during World War II. And his son, Michael, served in Desert Shield, the action preceding the 1991 war with Iraq that became known as Desert Storm. Now Stavola’s grandson, Lance Corporal Luke Eric Wilke, is serving in Iraq.

“Obviously, it's a two-edged sword,” Stavola told the Illinois-based Southtown Star. “There's an enormous amount of pride, but you're also fearful knowing what war is and can be.”

There has been a renewed sense of mission across the country, especially apparent on Memorial Day, to keep the memory of the past alive — both the horrors and atrocities, and the service and the heroism.

Memorial Day was originally known as Decoration Day because it was a day set aside to honor the nation's Civil War dead by decorating their graves. It grew exponentially from there, with several cities claiming to hold the first Memorial Day during the 1880s. After the end of World War I in 1918, communities began to honor all those who had died in America’s wars on Decoration Day. Finally, in 1971, Congress declared the last Monday in May to be the official holiday of Memorial Day.

But the days remaining to celebrate our oldest veterans are numbered.

According to the U.S. Department of Defense, only three veterans of World War I were still alive as of September 30, 2007, the last date for which estimates were available. Of the 16.1 million men and women who served in World War II, about 2.5 million were still alive as of that date, but the Defense Department estimates that they have been dying at a rate of 28,000 per month, or about 938 daily.

Now the nonprofit group Honor Flight is working quickly to meet its goal of flying every World War II veteran to Washington, D.C., to visit the World War II Memorial on the National Mall. "Our goal is that every World War II vet gets to see this memorial," said Honor Flight founder Earl Morse said, "because it's theirs, not ours."

USA Today chronicled one recent trip when the group flew veterans from Michigan to the capital. Army vet Arthur Kaczmarek, 88, told the paper, "This is just a fantastic thing they've done for us."