WWII Vets Take Spotlight

Their numbers grow smaller each year, and their gait is a shadow of the quickness that served them so well in combat. Still, America’s World War II veterans continue to dominate Veterans Day memorial services every year, and Thursday was no exception.

The men who sacrificed their youth to make the world safe for democracy represented the largest group of veterans who attended the traditional observances at El Toro Memorial Park and other sites across Orange County.

The citizen soldiers who defeated the Nazis in Europe and turned back the Japanese juggernaut in the Pacific said they keep showing up to honor their buddies who made the ultimate sacrifice.

“Our generation wasn’t necessarily more patriotic than the ones that followed, but for some reason we’ve always been more involved in veterans’ activities,” said Jesse Nichols, 76, who was a machine gunner with the 3rd Infantry Division in Europe.

“Many of us come to honor and remember the guys who got killed,” he said. “It’s been more than half a century, but there are things that happen to you in war that can never be forgotten.”

Thursday’s Veterans Day observances were the last of the century, a fact that had added meaning among the thinning ranks of men and women who served during World War II.

“Let’s see how many of us can meet here again next year,” said Edward Delaney, a Navy veteran.

The observance at El Toro Memorial Park in Lake Forest included a five-man honor guard from the Brothers of Vietnam, a veterans group from the Southeast Asian conflict. The Army, Marine and Navy veterans were dressed in camouflage fatigues introduced later in the war.

Memorial services also were held in other cities across the county. The observances featured bands, parades and patriotic speeches.

In Fullerton, veterans of several of America’s wars and conflicts marched together in a parade to Hillcrest Park, where ceremonies were held. A drum corps from Fullerton High School played along the parade route, and the school’s junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps also participated.

Marines from the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station served as color and honor guards and provided a rifle salute team at the Veterans Day service in Seal Beach. Master of ceremonies David Van Aken, a World War II veteran who served in the Army’s 86th Infantry Division in Europe, said most of the vets in attendance were from that war.

“But it was good to see veterans there from Korea and Vietnam, too,” Van Aken said.

Thursday’s ceremonies were sponsored by local posts of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion and Jewish War Veterans. But membership in these groups also is declining as World War II veterans die.

VFW officials predict that about half of their 1.9 million members will be dead in a decade. Membership already is down from 2.2 million four years ago.