Military Memories Monday: Memorial Day

Since World War II, 202 United States Air Force and Army Air Forces weather personnel and weather reconnaissance air crew have lost their lives serving in our nation's wars.  An additional 145 weather reconnaissance air crew have perished serving our nation during peacetime.  This 13-minute Memorial Day tribute video is in their honor:  https://www.dropbox.com/s/oum85js5ayfartq/Memorial%20Day%20Tribute.m4v

The video is a product of the project I was part of about six months ago, helping to locate a photograph of one of these gentlemen, Corporal Earl Emerson Jackson (1905-1943) of Athens and Dallas, Texas, as an adult.  The project was spearheaded by Chief Master Sergeant Craig M. Kirwin, Enlisted Functional Manager of the Weather Operations Division, Directorate of Operations, Headquarters Air Combat Command, United States Air Force.  He was kind enough to send me a link to the video.

I urge you to watch the whole video.  It made me cry, seeing the faces of so many young men who died too early.  It also inspired me to try to do some more research to find photos for some of those in the video for whom there aren't pictures.  

Here's a snip from the 3:27 mark in the video showing the photo I found of Earl Jackson:

I posted the story of my search for this photo in this blog about six months ago, followed the next day with Earl Jackson's life story.

© Amanda Pape - 2014 - click here to e-mail me.