I will get there this year!! I know it!!

Thanks for posting, Vee. What those men did there seems super human looking back. I forget, sometimes, that the men that took the island were in fact boys just like the ones I have working for me today. To put in perspective, we got some new Marines last fall and one of them was born after I joined the Marine Corps in 1995!! And I joined the Marine Corps 5 years after I graduated high school!! I must be absolutely ancient to their eyes!

But these are the ages of the men that fought across Iwo Jima, Omaha beach, and our five - Casablanca, Sicily, Salerno, Anzio and Southern France. That and thousands of other places were death was inches away be it from the enemy, cold, heat, poor maintenance on an aircraft, or any number of reasons.

I have one very minor connection with this topic.

My father was the Bandmaster in charge of the Royal Marine band that played at the UK premiere of the film THE SANDS OF IWO JIMA many years ago.

Colin.

That is very cool, Colin.