Many
of us lost a good friend this past week.
Ted Simonson was a teacher, football coach and the principal of Los Gatos High School
Ted was
also a World War II hero who, among many other heroic acts, jumped a Nazi
officer when his gun misfired while aimed at an America officer. That was just one
of the lives he saved while in the service.
Ted was a member of the 42nd Rainbow Division that “liberated”
the prisoners in Dachau ,
the infamous Nazi concentration camp.
My wife
Gayle’s oldest brother fought under General Patton. They too liberated prisoner of war camps,
freeing those fortunate enough to have survived to that point. This brings me to Dachau , the subject of this blog.
 |
| Entrance to Dachau, the concentration camp in Germany |
There are a lot of stories of the concentration
camps - mostly horrific - but I recently heard one exception. Evidently in this particular case the
liberating forces left the guns belonging to the Nazi guards loaded and in a
pile. The Americans looked the other way as the just-released and emaciated
prisoners took the guns and passed their judgment on those who had tortured
them for so long. Having seen Dachau myself, I have to
be honest - I like that ending.
My visit to
Dachau in 1969
was just one stop on my motorcycle trip.
It wasn’t as much fun as the island
of Krk Dachau
was not only depressing; it was a stark reminder of what man is capable of
perpetrating on his fellow man.
Set up as a memorial, Dachau is a horrible
graphic of what the Nazis did to their captives. I went through the gas chambers designed to
look like showers and saw the concrete slide where bodies were slid into trucks
for the next step in their elimination.
I saw the wooden bunks stacked up
against the walls, the ovens, the horrible photographs and much more than I
wanted to see. The gruesome sculpture at the entrance sets the mood for what
this place represents. Look closely at the
grotesque images in that metal depiction.
The mental imprint of Dachau
depresses me to this day.
Animals kill to eat and
survive. Cats sometimes play with their
prey. Baboons and apes have been known
to form gangs and go on rampages killing their own kind. But nothing compares to the human capacity to
find pleasure in inflicting pain and in killing other creatures including human
beings. It’s a horrible nexus of
“nature/nurture” and it raises many questions – more than I want to get into in
a blog.
I have the greatest respect for
Ted’s generation, their heroism during the war, and the legacy of freedom that they
left us. I have no use for someone who
would apologize for America
or attempt to destroy the foundations of the country that so many of these guys
fought and died for.
“The Greatest Generation” gave me
the unique opportunity to be a carefree kid in the ‘50s, with all the freedoms
that were still available to us back then.
As I said in my book, “The Huckleberry Days of the ‘50s,” I don’t think
there was ever a better decade to be a kid.
But the freedom I experienced in
the ‘50s wasn’t free. Most people in my generation understand that and
appreciate what we have been given. Sadly,
the America
we remember is becoming less and less recognizable. When a person receives something for nothing,
there is little appreciation and even less gratitude. How many flags did you see in your
neighborhood this past Memorial Day?
It's possible to be proud of the American
concept, but disgusted with government and its destructive policies.
I’m grateful to my parents and
the other members of “The Greatest Generation.” They gave us freedom and opportunity. What we and subsequent generations do with
the America
that was passed on to us is now beyond the reach of that ‘greatest’ generation. They did their part and handed the baton to
us. What happened?
It's amazing that there are those who believe it never happened.... who could make up something like that?
ReplyDeleteYes, it was a "Great Generation", wasn't it? But it wasn't the government that was great... it was the people and their core values. There will never be a government that can provide us with that. As a people, we're going to have to re-discover it within ourselves. I only hope it doesn't take a war to do it.
My Dad fought in WW2 (a Jew, no less, and a bomber navigator), and I never thought to ask him what it all had meant to him, until he was already gone. I wish I had.
I agree. I tried to make the distinction toward the end that America and what it stood for is great, but freedom requires eternal vigilance, as one of our founders said. Unfortunately, I think we've used our freedom to unlock the door to the asylum.
ReplyDeleteIt's too bad you didn't get a chance to talk to your dad, but most of those guys didn't want to talk or even remember what they experienced.
I feel that it is I who caused my kids to have less than a sound understanding of just what it takes to keep America strong. By continually letting them think they deserved the best and that their 'opinions' mattered as much as those of others has left us with a country where honest compromise is viewed as a dirty word. My opinion, regardless of the facts rules today in a government, at all levels, that has ceased to be able to get any results.
ReplyDeleteI wish I had done a better job of making my children understand that opinion has nothing to do with facts and that you don't diminish yourself when you get an honest compromise that allows a country to move forward.
Excellent point, Malcolm - "Opinion vs facts"
ReplyDeleteAlso "Honest compromise" doesn't diminish the individual or a political party. Another good point.
Sadly, "Honest" is the qualification and the word is almost an oxymoron in politics.