Remember. . .

"Posterity: you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it." ~ John Quincy Adams

James Carter, 42, AL

Shane Duffy, 22, MA

Thomas Duncan, III, TX

Jonathan Emard, 20, TX

James Finley, 21, MO

Quincy Green, 26, TX

Scott Hagerty, 41, OK

Derek Holland, 20, PA

David Hurst, 31, OK

Cody Legg, 23, CA

Steve McCoy, 23, GA

Andre McNair, Jr., 20, FL

Justin Mixon, 22, LA

Andrew Shields, 19, WA

Lance Waldorf, 40, MT

My Second Book!

I have published a second book, which is a 120 page examination of Auschwitz-Birkenau. In addition to including my photos from the various visits to this camp, I also included diary entries from SS, prisoners, and Jewish Sonderkommando members, who worked in the seven crematoriums. The Wind Wails: Inside Auschwitz-Birkenau will be available to purchase at the end of this month. I thought to sell it on Amazon.com or Barnes and Noble, but they take 55% right off the top! I'd rather this money be applied to my Holocaust work and therefore, will be privately selling copies.

My first book There Exists a Fence, which is about the Yurburg, Lithuania, Jewish cemetery restoration project also continues to do quite well.

Thoughts

If you think you are beaten, you are;
If you think you dare not, you don't.
If you'd like to win, but think you can't,
It's almost a cinch that you won't.
If you think you'll lose, you're lost.
For out in the world we find
Success begins with a fellow's will;
It's all a state of mind.

If you think you're outclassed, you are;
You've got to think high to rise.
You've got to be sure of yourself before
you can ever win the prize.
Life's battles don't always go
to the stronger or faster man;
But sooner or later, the man who wins
is the one who thinks he can.
--Unknown

Remember. . .

"There are those, I know, who will say that the liberation of humanity, the freedom of man and mind, is nothing but a dream. They are right. It is the American dream." ~Archibald MacLeish

Christian Cotner, 20, CT

Chris McCarthy, VA

Kyle Norris, 22, OH

David Nunez, 27, CA

Joshua Waltenbaugh, 19, PA

Remember. . .

"Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." ~ JFK

Jeffrey Ammon, 37, UT

Matthew Brown, 20, PA

Justin Buxbaum, 23, ME

William Cooper, 22, MS

Victor Cota, 33, AZ

Robert Crutchfield, 21, OH

John Daggett, 21, AZ

Jason Dene, 37, VT

Jeffrey DePrimo, 35, PA

Blake Evans, 24, IL

Frank Gasper, 25, CA

Chris Gathercole, 21, CA

Branden Haunert, 21, OH

Howard Jones, Jr., 35, IL

Joseph Moore, 54, ID

Chad Trimble, 29, CA

Davy Weaver, 39, GA

Soldiers Angels

I have been involved with Soldiers Angels since 2004 and cannot fully express the importance of supporting America's service members. Most people do not realize how much a piece of mail or a care package means to someone who is thousands of miles away from home deployed to either a FOB in Iraq or to a Navy ship on the high seas. A fellow member of Soldiers Angels shared the following letter her soldier sent her with the organization. I think it is beautiful.



"Cards, care packages, cookies, they're not going to stop that bullet or that IED but do you all know what they do? They bring a small piece of home to us. Sure you might not be here on the front line covered in filth, smelling like hell, your heart going a mile a min not knowing what's coming next. If your next step is on that TRP or if your going to be the latest recruiting tool for some insurgents new video while they take pot shots at you. But what you all do with those cards, care packages, cookies is just as important. YOU have the greatest power of ANYONE here. YOU can send us a small piece of home. I don't know it this makes any sense to you but, when I get a box or anyone else get's a box its hard to describe. You find a nice quite corner and everyone knows not to bother you. You sit there and look over the box as if you had never seen anything like it before. You read who it's from and a smile crosses your face, you recognize the name. You might already know what's inside, but it does not matter. Some tear it open as fast as they can, others take their time and enjoy every sec of it. Once inside, you go threw it, every little item once, twice, sometimes three times, it's a very delicate process. You breath it in and you think of the person who sent it to you. You think of home, family, cars, summer.....everything all at once and for a very short time, you are there away from this SH#$T hole. You are grateful. Then you look around and there's always a buddy who is down or having a bad day you share your box. Sometimes just with the one guy, sometimes with everyone and it's electric. Everyone catches that feeling and we start talking about home, about things we miss, things we are going to do when we get back and the heaviness of the day lifts and it's not so bad. C, its not the "things" that are sent that matter to us, it's the thought. That's the power ALL of you have who take the time to send things. You can change the worst day into the best day, in a split second. "

Memorial Day

I have been in PA since Friday and will combine my Remember post with today's Memorial Day reflection. My aunt, Rev. Connie Gibbs, wrote the following poem:

WE Must Remember
--Rev. Connie Gibbs

We pause on this Memorial Day, a brief moment in time,
to bring close to our hearts those memories we hold so dear
of the men and women before us who unselfishly put their dreams,
and their lives on the line, where danger lay as a stalker,
waiting to take away each breath,
while the soldier plowed with determination the furrows of death.

We must remember, we must, you and I, those special heroes who chose to
fly through the skies of blue that turned as dark as the midnight sky.
Their wings began to shudder as smoke choked their breath away,
And hope gave way to the resignation, “Today, I’m going to die.”

Treading waters so deep and wide, for God and Country, their hearts abide.
Surprised by attacks with brutal disregard for human life,
they fought to the end, knowing that life and limb would be lost,
whether of self or friend.

Yes, by land, by sea, and in the skies, they fought for our land,
Fighting for freedom so that you and I might stand,
Stand for what is right, for what is good and true, fight that we might
say without fear, “God loves you.”

Yes, we must remember for freedom is not cheap,
for lives and limbs were lost so that we might keep, all the things that we
have and all the things that we do,
Like cars and boats and a house with a roof. Like going to church without fear,
And reading the Bible where we find the truth. The truth of knowing that whether
We are red, yellow, black or white, we are all God’s children and we need to learn to
Love one another as God first loved us.
For if there is to be peace on earth, where all of humankind is free, it must begin with each of us, let it begin with you and with me.

Yurburg Website!

The Yurburg, Lithuania, Jewish cemetery restoration project finally has a website!! I am so excited about this news and also because the DVDs are also completed. When we arrived at the cemetery, my first thought was, "Dear God. How are we ever going to finish in time?" Fortunately, we were able to put up 700 ft of new fence, unearth and upright about 100 headstone, and clean existing erect headstones. A piece of me will always exist in Yurburg, Lithuania, and when some days seem longer than most, my mind drifts to a distant place and finds peace for there exists a fence.

Project Preservation's next project is in the Ukraine. I will not be participating this time, but will be on the next one.

Check out the link:

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~projpreservation/yurburg/

My Yurburg book is also doing fantastic, which makes me happy simply because the lost Jewish community will not be forgotten. Check out my book at the link to the right that says, "My Book".

Remember. . .

"The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil Constitution, are worth defending at all hazards; and it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors: they purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood, and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men." ~ Samuel Adams


Casey Casanova, 22, MS (first female from MS to die in Iraq)
Ara Tyler Deysie, 18, AZ
Jessica Ellis, 24, OR
Joseph Ford, 23, ID
Alex Gonzalez, 21, TX
Jeremy Gullett, 22, KY
Miguel Guzman, 21, CA
Mary Jane Jaenichen, 20, CA
James Kimple, 21, OH
Glen Martinez, 31, CO (his wife, also a Marine stationed in Fallujah, Iraq, accompanied his body home)
Jeffrey Nichols, 21, TX
Isaac Palomarez, 26, CO
Kevin Roberts, 25, NM
Aaron Ward, 19, CA

Irena Sendler

I have visited Warsaw several times and have occasionally explored the remains of the Jewish ghetto. Naturally, many of the buildings were destroyed during the uprising in 1943 then during the Soviet siege of the city. However, the surviving structures are something everyone should visit at least once. No regular tour guides, though, venture to that part of the city and exploration is self-motivated. How anyone could have survived the Warsaw ghetto is a miracle. How anyone could have smuggled and saved 2500 Jewish children from the ghetto is an even bigger miracle.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080512/ap_on_re_eu/obit_sendler

Remember. . .

"This is essentially a people's contest... whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men - to lift artificial weights from all shoulders - to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all - to afford all, an unfettered start and a fair chance, in the race of life."
- Abraham Lincoln


Bryan Bolander, 26, CA
Chad Caldwell, 24, WA
Clay Craig, 22, TX
William Dix, 32, CA
Lawrence Ezell, 30, TX
Adam Marion, 26, NC
Marcus Mathes, 26, FL
David McCormick, 26, TX
David McDowell, 30, CA
Guadalupe Ramirez, 26, CA
Mark Stone, 22, TX

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to one of the most important woman in my life. Not only has she instilled values and determination in me, but her continuous display of compassion and love has been such a powerful influence. She has been such a fantastic friend and mother and my hope is to be the kind of woman to my children as she has been to me.

What is a Mother?

"A Mother has so many things to do,

From washing, ironing, cleaning to tying a shoe.

She scrubs, she mends, she cooks and sews,

She bathes the children and washes their clothes.

When they forget to wash their faces clean,

And their clothes are the muddiest you've ever seen,

Who repairs the clothes and scrubs them like new?

Of course, that is what a Mother will do.
Who becomes the doctor or the nurse when they are ill,

Applying a bandage or giving them a pill?

Who becomes a teacher when a child has homework?

She must never her duty shirk.

Who becomes a detective to find a toy or a book?

For missing things she must look and look?

Who becomes a listener to every heartache,

To every accomplishment that a child makes?

Who scolds their children when they are naughty,

Or remind them of God when they are to haughty?

Who tends her family with love and patience, too?

Of course that is what a Mother will do."

- Unknown

Happy 60th Birthday, Israel!!

HaTikvah ("The Hope")----Israeli National Anthem

As long as the Jewish spirit is yearning deep in the heart,
With eyes turned toward the East, looking toward Zion,
Then our hope - the two-thousand-year-old hope - will not be lost:
To be a free people in our land,
The land of Zion and Jerusalem

Remember. . .

I am a member of Soldiers Angels and one of the teams I am on is called the Living Legends. This team provides support to the families who have lost a soldier either in Operation Iraqi Freedom or Operation Enduring Freedom. Each Sunday, on my previous blog, I dedicated the Sunday post to the fallen soldiers I had received during the week. I decided to continue this ritual here as well.

"Bravery is the capacity to perform properly even when scared half to death." ~ Omar Bradley

John Bishop, 22, MI

Ronald Blystone, 34, MO

Timothy Cunningham, 26, TX

Dwayne Davis, 29, OK

Merlin German, 22, NY

Jordan Haerter, 19, NY

Andrew Pearson, 32, MT

Ronald Tucker, 21, CO

Matthew Vandegrift, 28, CO

Shaun Whitehead, 24, GA

Jonathan Yale, 21, VA

Jonathan Yelner, 24, CA

New Blog

For the past almost two years I have been blogging on Yahoo 360 and for some reason my blog no longer exists! So, I have returned to this site, dusted it off, and will resume posting here. I will still designate every Sunday for my "Remember" posts.

Miami Memorial

These pictures are from Miami's Holocaust Memorial.

The Value of a $1.00

My friend sent me this interesting piece and I thought to pass it along:

Take out a one dollar bill, and look at it. The one dollar bill you're looking at first came off the presses in 1957 in its present design. This so-called paper money is in fact a cotton and linen blend, with red and blue minute silk fibers running through it. It is actually material. We've all washed it without it falling apart. A special blend of ink is used, the contents we will never know. It is overprinted with symbols and then it is starched to make it water resistant and pressed to give it that nice crisp look.
If you look on the front of the bill, you will see the United States Treasury Seal. On the top you will see the scales for a balanced budget. In the center you have a carpenter's square, a tool used for an even cut. Underneath is the Key to the United States Treasury. That's all pretty easy to figure out, but what is on the back of that dollar bill is something we should all know. If you turn the bill over, you will see two circles. Both circles, together, comprise the Great Seal of the United States. The First Continental Congress requested that Benjamin Franklin and a group of men come up with a Seal. It took them four years to accomplish this task and another two years to get it approved.
If you look at the left-hand circle, you will see a Pyramid. Notice the face is lighted, and the western side is dark. This country was just beginning. We had not begun to explore the West or decided what we could do for Western Civilization. The Pyramid is uncapped, again signifying that we were not even close to being finished. Inside the capstone you have the all-seeing eye, an ancient symbol for divinity. It was Franklin's belief that one man couldn't do it alone, but a group of men, with the help of God, could do anything. "IN GOD WE TRUST" is on this currency. The Latin above the pyramid, ANNUIT COEPTIS, means, "God has favored our undertaking." The Latin below the pyramid, NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM, means, "a new order has begun."
At the base of the pyramid is the Roman Numeral for 1776. If you look at the right-hand circle, and check it carefully, you will learn that it is on every National Cemetery in the United States. It is also on the Parade of Flags Walkway at the Bushnell, Florida National Cemetery, and is the centerpiece of most hero's monuments. Slightly modified, it is the seal of the President of the United States, and it is always visible whenever he speaks, yet very few people know what the symbols mean.
The Bald Eagle was selected as a symbol for victory for two reasons: First, he is not afraid of a storm; he is strong, and he is smart enough to soar above it. Secondly, he wears no material crown. We had just broken from the King of England. Also, notice the shield is unsupported. This country can now stand on its own. At the top of that shield you have a white bar signifying congress, a unifying factor. We were coming together as one nation. In the Eagle's beak you will read, "E PLURIBUS UNUM", meaning, "one nation from many people". Above the Eagle, you have thirteen stars, representing the thirteen original colonies, and any clouds of misunderstanding rolling away. Again, we were coming together as one.. Notice what the Eagle holds in his talons. He holds an olive branch and arrows. This country wants peace, but we will never be afraid to fight to preserve peace. The Eagle always wants to face the olive branch, but in time of war, his gaze turns toward the arrows.
They say that the number 13 is an unlucky number. This is almost a worldwide belief. You will usually never see a room numbered 13, or any hotels or motels with a 13th floor. But think about this: 13 original colonies, 13 signers of the Declaration of Independence, 13 stripes on our flag, 13 steps on the Pyramid, 13 letters in the Latin above, 13 letters in "E Pluribus Unum", 13 stars above the Eagle, 13 bars on that shield, 13 leaves on the olive branch, 13 fruits, and if you look closely, 13 arrows. And, for minorities: the 13th Amendment.

Remember. . .

Edward Garvin, 19, MA
Philip Johnson, 19, CT
Scott Nisely, 48, IA
Brad Payne, 24, AL
Benjamin Rosales, 20, TX
Jeffrey Shaffer, 21, AK
Kampha Sourivong, 20, IA
Angelo Vaccaro, 23, FL

Remember. . .

These are this past week's living legends soldiers:

Jerry Durbin Jr., 26, TX
Merideth Howard, 52, WI
Casey Mellen, 21, AZ
Clarence McSwain, 31, MS
Jared Raymond, 20, MA
Jonathan Rojas, 27, IN
Aaron Seal, 23, IN
Aaron Smith, 31, TX
Travis Zimmerman, 19, PA

May their service and sacrifice never be forgotten

Elie Wiesel

I recently had the honor to attend one of Elie Wiesel's receptions and lectures hosted by Dor Chadash in NYC. He is a remarkable individual who has lived, learned, and lost in this life. Society needs to really listen to his words:

"Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forgot that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. . . Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God himself. Never."