The Greatest Generation Live Podcast

PTSD and World War II: The Hidden Legacy

Join the Veterans Breakfast Club on Thursday, June 26 at 7:00pm ET for a powerful Greatest Generation Live conversation exploring the often-overlooked legacy of World War II: the emotional wounds carried home by veterans and the lasting impact on their families. This free, virtual event will be held on Zoom and streamed to YouTube and Facebook.
Our featured guests are Carol Schultz Vento, daughter of 82nd Airborne Division paratrooper Arthur “Dutch” Schultz, and Susan Friedenberg, daughter of Army medic and D-Day veteran Bernie Friedenberg. Both men served heroically in WWII, both returned home deeply changed by their experiences, and both left lasting imprints on their families.
Carol Schultz Vento is the author of The Hidden Legacy of World War II: A Daughter’s Journey of Discovery, a moving memoir that weaves historical research with personal reflection. Her father, Dutch Schultz, jumped into Normandy on D-Day with the 82nd Airborne and later appeared as himself in the film The Longest Day. Though celebrated for his bravery, Dutch struggled with undiagnosed PTSD throughout his life—a condition that shaped Carol’s upbringing and ultimately led her to uncover his wartime past and her family’s hidden story. Carol’s forthcoming memoir, Twisted Strands: Family Secrets and Intergenerational Trauma, offers an intimate look at how war’s psychological toll can echo through generations.
Joining Carol is Susan Friedenberg, whose father Bernie Friedenberg landed on Omaha Beach as a combat medic and treated the wounded under relentless fire. A Jewish-American war hero who later helped liberate concentration camps, Bernie lived with the psychological burden of his service for the rest of his life. His story is commemorated in a new Atlantic City memorial and honored on the website berniefriedenbergworldwariimemorial.com.
This event promises to be a candid, emotional, and enlightening conversation about courage, trauma, and the enduring bonds between veterans and their children.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

The Normandy Campaign Beyond D-Day

The Veterans Breakfast Club invites you to a special Greatest Generation Live hosted by Glenn Flickinger. This program will shine a spotlight on an often-overlooked chapter of World War II: the Battle of Normandy from June to August 1944, the brutal and pivotal campaign that followed the famous D-Day landings.
While June 6, 1944—D-Day—has been seared into public memory as a symbol of Allied courage and sacrifice, the bitter, grinding combat that followed in the Norman hedgerows, villages, and fields is less frequently remembered. Yet it was this prolonged and costly battle that ultimately broke the back of German resistance in France and opened the road to Paris and beyond.
Joining Glenn Flickinger is acclaimed military historian Joseph Balkoski, widely recognized as one of the foremost experts on the Normandy campaign. Balkoski is the author of several authoritative works, including the classic Beyond the Beachhead: The 29th Infantry Division in Normandy. In this deeply researched and vivid account, he tells the story of the 29th Infantry Division’s harrowing fight from Omaha Beach through the hedgerow hell of Normandy, drawing from personal accounts, official records, and battlefield tours he has led for decades.
Joseph Balkoski has been called “the top living D-Day historian” by USA Today, and his work has been praised for its balanced narrative, sharp analysis, and deep respect for the men who served. His other titles include Omaha Beach, Utah Beach, and additional volumes on the 29th Division’s role in the European Theater.
This event is free and open to all. Join the conversation, ask questions, and help us remember not just the landing, but the long and deadly struggle that followed.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

We Like Ike! The Rise of Eisenhower and the D-Day Invasion

Join Glenn Flickinger with our featured guests Michel Paradis, author of The Light of Battle: Eisenhower, D-Day and the Birth of the American Superpower. Michel’s book is a unique look at Eisenhower’s rise from obscurity to Supreme Commander of Operation Overlord in a two-year period. He looks at the key figures who influenced Ike’s development and what, who and how molded him into the supreme commander. It is a unique view of General Eisenhower never before seen from this perspective.
Michael Paradis’s new book offers a sweeping examination of Dwight D. Eisenhower’s leadership during the Normandy invasion, and how D-Day not only shaped the outcome of World War II but also laid the groundwork for America’s emergence as a global superpower. He will talk about Eisenhower’s challenges in forging and leading the largest multinational military force in history, the decisions that shaped the success of the landings, and what D-Day means in the broader arc of American and world history.
D-Day, known as Operation Overlord, marked the beginning of the liberation of Western Europe from Nazi control. The landings involved over 150,000 Allied troops from the United States, Britain, Canada, and other nations, who stormed the beaches of Normandy under withering fire. The cost was staggering, but the operation’s success was a turning point in the war, hastening the defeat of Nazi Germany.
This Veterans Breakfast Club conversation will be an opportunity not just to recount the historical facts but to listen to personal stories, explore the human side of history, and honor the courage of those who fought. Expect an engaging and moving discussion that deepens our understanding of D-Day’s significance, both then and now.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

Liberation of German POW Camps in April 1945

Glenn Flickinger, with guests Marilyn Walton and Nancy Putnam share the history of the liberation of the two POW camps where their fathers where imprisoned, Stalag Luft I and Stalag Luft III/VIIA in the closing weeks of World War II. Marilyn was the historical POW consultant to “Masters of the Air”, and the author of several books on the subject. Nancy has been a key leader of the 100th Bomb Group foundation for many years. Both know the stories of their fathers’ experience in-depth. Both have been frequent guests and contributors to the VBC.
April 1945 marked a period of swift and determined Allied advances into Nazi Germany, resulting in the liberation of dozens of Prisoner of War (POW) camps scattered throughout the Reich. These were not the infamous concentration camps of the Holocaust, but German-run military camps—Stalag Luft camps where the Luftwaffe held allied airmen in the tens of thousands. The liberation of these camps was often hasty and chaotic, occurring as Allied forces moved deeper into German territory amid collapsing German resistance and growing humanitarian urgency.
By April, many of the German guards at POW camps were either fleeing westward, surrendering, or in some cases, preparing to evacuate prisoners toward the interior of Germany to avoid capture by the Soviets. American and British forces liberated many of these camps in Central and Western Germany as they advanced on a broad front from the west.
One of the first major American POW camps liberated in April was Stalag VII-A, located in Moosburg, Bavaria. It was the largest POW camp in Germany, holding over 76,000 prisoners of war by war’s end, including a substantial number of American airmen. On April 29, 1945, the U.S. 14th Armored Division of General George Patton’s Third Army captured the camp after a brief firefight with German forces in the vicinity. The American tanks rolled into Moosburg to find the camp severely overcrowded, with prisoners of multiple nationalities held in worsening conditions due to months of inadequate rations and medical supplies.
Stalag IX-B in Bad Orb, one of the more notorious camps due to poor conditions and mistreatment of American prisoners, especially Jewish GIs, was liberated on April 2, 1945, by units of the U.S. 44th Infantry Division. The camp had housed thousands of Americans, many of whom were suffering from malnutrition and disease. Several hundred American POWs had been singled out there for forced labor based on their religion or ethnicity.
Stalag VII-A, in Moosburg, also deserves mention for the sheer diversity of its prisoner population by April 1945. In addition to American troops, it held British, French, Russian, and other Allied servicemen. American airmen made up a substantial portion, many having been shot down during the strategic bombing campaigns of 1943–1945 over Germany.
Stalag IX-A, located in Ziegenhain, near Kassel, was liberated on March 30, 1945, just ahead of the April wave. It held a mix of American and British prisoners. Nearby, Stalag IX-C at Bad Sulza was liberated by American forces on April 11, 1945, and among the prisoners were American medical personnel and other servicemen who had been captured during the Battle of the Bulge and other late-war operations.
Conditions in many of these camps had sharply deteriorated in the final months of the war, with German logistics collapsing under Allied pressure. Food shortages, overcrowding, and disease were rampant. The liberation of the camps often took place without formal fighting; German guards frequently fled or surrendered without resistance, though some did attempt to relocate prisoners ahead of advancing armies.
The liberation of the POW camps in April 1945 was not a single event but a series of overlapping rescues carried out by converging Allied armies amid the chaotic collapse of Nazi Germany. While some prisoners had been on the move for weeks—relocated on foot or by rail to evade advancing armies—others were found in place, emaciated and sick but alive. Their liberation marked the end of a long ordeal and the beginning of the effort to reintegrate tens of thousands of captured servicemen back into postwar life.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

History of WWII Liberty Ships

We welcome our own Naval Academy-bound Trey Burman on the program to discuss the history of the WWII Liberty Ship. Trey has volunteered on the SS John W. Brown for years and will share the history and details he’s learned on board the ship.
During World War II, the United States faced an urgent need to transport troops, equipment, and supplies across oceans under threat from enemy submarines. The solution came in the form of the Liberty ship—an unglamorous but revolutionary cargo vessel that played a vital role in the Allied victory. Conceived as a mass-produced, quickly built ship based on a British design, the Liberty ship program became one of the great industrial feats of the war.
The standard Liberty ship measured 441 feet long and could carry over 10,000 tons of cargo. Powered by a triple-expansion steam engine, the ships cruised at a modest 11 knots. Their real strength, however, lay in their numbers. From 1941 to 1945, American shipyards produced 2,710 Liberty ships, an astonishing pace that helped offset staggering losses at sea. Shipyards across the country adopted assembly-line techniques and prefabricated sections to slash construction time from months to mere weeks. The record was set by the SS Robert E. Peary, launched just 4 days and 15 hours after its keel was laid.
Though initially derided as “ugly ducklings” or “dime a dozen,” Liberty ships proved durable and indispensable. They carried two-thirds of all cargo transported from the U.S. to overseas fronts and were manned by merchant seamen and Navy Armed Guard units, who braved enemy attacks to keep supply lines open. More than 200 Liberty ships were lost to enemy action during the war.
Among the surviving few today is the SS John W. Brown, one of only two operational Liberty ships still afloat. Built in Baltimore in 1942 at the Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyard, the John W. Brown served in both the Atlantic and Mediterranean theaters, delivering cargo and supporting troop movements. She also served as a floating high school in New York City for decades after the war, offering vocational training to students until 1982.
In the late 1980s, a group of preservationists rescued the John W. Brown from scrapping and returned her to her birthplace in Baltimore. Today, she operates as a museum ship and living memorial to the Merchant Marine and Navy Armed Guard. Maintained by Project Liberty Ship, a volunteer organization, the vessel offers public tours, educational programs, and occasional “Living History Cruises” where visitors can experience life aboard a World War II-era cargo ship in motion.
The Liberty ships, and the John W. Brown in particular, stand as enduring symbols of American industrial might, civilian sacrifice, and the often-overlooked heroism of the Merchant Marine. Their story is not just one of steel and steam, but of the human effort to move the machinery of democracy across perilous seas.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

The Liberation of the Concentration Camps in 1945

Glenn Flickinger and Scott Masters welcome liberators of Nazi concentration camps in the spring of 1945 to share their stories. 
Frank Cohn, a Holocaust survivor, fled Nazi Germany with his mother in 1938, just before Kristallnacht. He later served in the US Army during World War II, becoming a member of the 12th Army Group Intelligence Unit, returning to Europe to fight the Nazis. Cohn’s experiences in Nazi Germany and his subsequent service in the US Army provide a powerful testament to his resilience and dedication. 
Hilbert Margol served as an artillery gunner in the 42nd “Rainbow” Infantry Division during World War II. He participated in the liberation of Dachau concentration camp on April 29, 1945, and were part of the Army of Occupation in Austria after the war.Denise Fikman-Hans, born in Paris in 1938, endured the upheavals of World War II as a young Jewish girl in Nazi-occupied France. In 1942, her father, aunt, and uncle were arrested and deported to Auschwitz. To protect her children, Denise’s mother sent her six children and two nieces into hiding, initially placing them on a farm. However, the children were soon separated and sent to different families, and eventually to a convent and monastery. Denise remained in the convent until 1948, after which she returned to Paris to live with her mother and stepfather.
As Allied forces advanced deep into Nazi-held territory, they uncovered the horrific realities of the Holocaust. Between April and May of that year, U.S., British, and Canadian troops liberated several concentration camps, exposing to the world the scale of Nazi atrocities and marking a turning point in both the war and human conscience.
The U.S. Army was the first to encounter one of the major camps when, on April 4, 1945, soldiers of the 89th and 4th Armored Divisions entered Ohrdruf, a subcamp of Buchenwald in central Germany. What they found shocked even the most battle-hardened troops: piles of emaciated corpses, torture devices, and starving survivors. General Dwight D. Eisenhower visited Ohrdruf personally and ordered widespread documentation, anticipating that people might one day deny what had happened. This liberation was followed by the discovery of Buchenwald itself on April 11, where thousands of prisoners had staged an uprising just before U.S. forces arrived. American soldiers found around 21,000 prisoners, many at the brink of death.
Meanwhile, U.S. troops also liberated Dachau, the notorious camp near Munich, on April 29, 1945. Dachau, the first Nazi concentration camp established in 1933, had become a model for other camps and a symbol of Nazi terror. American soldiers from the 45th and 42nd Infantry Divisions encountered over 30,000 prisoners, many sick and dying, and dozens of train cars filled with decomposing bodies outside the gates. The sights of Dachau provoked profound revulsion and led to acts of reprisal against SS guards.
British forces made their most significant discovery at Bergen-Belsen in northern Germany, liberated on April 15, 1945. The British 11th Armoured Division found 60,000 prisoners in appalling conditions—most suffering from starvation, typhus, and dysentery. Nearly 10,000 unburied corpses lay scattered across the grounds. British soldiers quickly began relief operations, bringing in food, medical supplies, and bulldozers to bury the dead. Despite their efforts, thousands of survivors continued to die from disease and malnutrition in the days following liberation.
Canadian soldiers, advancing as part of the First Canadian Army in the Netherlands and northern Germany, encountered and liberated smaller satellite camps and forced-labor sites tied to the Nazi system of exploitation. In northern German regions, Canadians helped liberate prisoners in camps near Neuengamme and other subcamps associated with the Nazi war machine.
The liberation of these camps left an indelible mark on the soldiers who witnessed them and the world that soon learned of the atrocities. The Allies’ documentation of the camps would form crucial evidence in postwar trials and historical record, ensuring that the crimes of the Holocaust could never be hidden or forgotten.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

WWII Veterans Remember V-E Day, 80th Anniversary

Glenn Flickinger and Scott Masters welcome a large group of World War II veterans to share memories of V-E Day, Victory in Europe, on May 8, 1945. The veterans include George Rubin, Joe Peterburs, Brenda Reid, and Mary Owen.
Brenda Reid served from 1943 to 1945 in the Women’s Royal Canadian Naval Service (officially known as the Wrens).  She trained in LORAN (long range navigation) in Connecticut. With her new skills, she was sent to Lower Whitehead (Deming Island, Nova Scotia) where she took up her position maintaining the sensitive machinery at the only Wren-run station. Reid spent close to two years in the Navy and at Whitehead. She met her future husband while serving, who was in the RCAF and stationed at a nearby radar base. After the war ended, they returned to Toronto, Ontario where they married.
Mary Owen, a WREN (Royal Canadian Naval Reserve) in World War II, was a vital part of the Battle of the Atlantic. She served at the LORAN (long-range navigation) station in East Baccaro, Nova Scotia, where her work in signals and communications helped ensure the safe transport of soldiers and war materiel across the Atlantic, ultimately contributing to the Allied victory.
George Rubin served as a B-17 waist gunner in the U.S. 8th Air Force, 486th Bomb Group, 835th Squadron. After graduating high school in 1943, he was drafted and initially trained as a pilot before being reassigned to a bomber crew in England. Between late 1944 and early 1945, Rubin flew 18 bombing missions over Germany. On February 25, 1945, during a mission over Munich, his aircraft sustained severe flak damage, losing two engines and suffering 270 holes. Despite his leg injury, Rubin jettisoned the bombs safely to avoid civilian casualties, ensuring they wouldn’t detonate upon impact. The crew crash-landed near Sonthofen, Germany, where they were captured by Hitler Youth members and faced potential execution, which was averted by a German officer. Rubin was subsequently imprisoned at Dulag Luft and later transferred to Stalag 13D and then Stalag 7A, enduring forced marches and harsh conditions until liberation by General Patton’s forces on April 30, 1945 .​
Colonel Joe Peterburs was a distinguished World War II fighter pilot whose service exemplified courage and resilience. Born in 1924, he joined the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1942 and trained on aircraft like the P-40 Warhawk before transitioning to the P-51 Mustang. Deployed to England in late 1944, Peterburs flew 49 combat missions, primarily escorting B-17 bombers over Europe.
On May 8, 1945—Victory in Europe (V-E) Day—Americans across the United States and overseas greeted the news of Nazi Germany’s unconditional surrender with a mix of jubilation, relief, and solemn reflection. After nearly four years of war following Pearl Harbor, the end of combat in Europe signaled a long-awaited milestone. Spontaneous celebrations erupted in major cities such as New York, Washington, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Crowds gathered in the streets, waving flags, singing, and cheering. Churches held services of thanksgiving, while factories paused work for impromptu assemblies. In Times Square, thousands poured in shoulder to shoulder, and in Washington, D.C., crowds assembled near the White House, where President Harry S. Truman—who had taken office only weeks earlier after the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt—dedicated the victory to his predecessor, calling it “a solemn but glorious hour.”
Yet the national mood was not one of unrestrained elation. For many, the joy was tempered by the cost of victory—more than 400,000 American lives lost in the war—and the knowledge that the fighting in the Pacific continued. Families who had lost loved ones marked the day in private, with quiet remembrance rather than public celebration. Newspapers struck a somber tone alongside celebratory headlines, reminding readers of the ongoing war against Japan.
American service members in the Pacific, by contrast, received the news with little fanfare. Their war was far from over. Preparations were already underway for the invasion of Okinawa, and the prospect of a bloody ground assault on Japan loomed ahead. While they welcomed Germany’s defeat, Pacific troops knew it did not mean homecoming—at least not yet.
Overall, V-E Day marked a moment of deep national significance. It united Americans in pride and gratitude, even as the shadow of continued conflict muted the full joy of peace. For those in uniform, it meant an end to one campaign and, for many, the start of another.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

How World War II Ended in Europe

Glenn Flickinger welcomes David W. Hogan, Jr., former Director of Histories at the U.S. Army Center of Military History, to talk about the end of World War II in Europe. 
Russ Freeburg also joins us too share this story and insights. Russ served in the 8th Armored Division, 9th Army and is a retired journalist and author of "Oil & War: How the Deadly Struggle for Fuel in WWII Meant Victory or Defeat." 
The book is a detailed historical analysis of how access to oil determined the strategies, movements, and ultimate outcomes of World War II. The book argues that the global conflict was as much about securing fuel as it was about defeating enemy forces, showing how Germany, Japan, and the Allies made crucial decisions—such as Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union and Japan’s push toward Southeast Asia—based on the need for oil. Drawing on military records and firsthand accounts, the authors reveal how fuel shortages crippled the Axis powers and gave the Allies a decisive advantage.
The final stage of World War II in Europe unfolded rapidly between April and May 1945. On April 12, President Franklin D. Roosevelt died suddenly of a cerebral hemorrhage in Warm Springs, Georgia, after leading the United States through most of the war. His death shocked the Allied world, but leadership transferred smoothly to Vice President Harry S. Truman, who committed to following Roosevelt’s strategy of unconditional German surrender.
In the meantime, Allied forces were closing in on Nazi Germany from both east and west. The Western Allies, including U.S. and British troops, advanced through western Germany, liberating cities and uncovering the horrors of Nazi concentration and extermination camps—among them Buchenwald, Dora-Mittelbau, and Dachau. These discoveries brought the full extent of the Holocaust into public view, revealing mass killings, forced labor, and the systematic extermination of millions.
To the east, Soviet forces under Marshal Georgy Zhukov pushed toward Berlin in a final, brutal assault. Although the Western Allies had the capability to push into Berlin, a decision was made—agreed upon at the Yalta Conference and reaffirmed in April 1945—not to contest the Soviets for the German capital. General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander, instead focused on southern Germany and Austria to eliminate remaining German resistance and avoid unnecessary casualties in a race to Berlin.
On April 25, 1945, American and Soviet troops met at the Elbe River near Torgau, Germany. The historic link-up symbolized the effective splitting of Nazi Germany and was a powerful moment of Allied unity. Meanwhile, Berlin was encircled and under heavy bombardment.
As the Red Army closed in, Adolf Hitler took refuge in his Führerbunker beneath the Reich Chancellery. On April 30, 1945, with Soviet troops just blocks away, Hitler committed suicide alongside his companion Eva Braun, whom he had married the day before. His death marked the symbolic collapse of the Nazi regime.
Following Hitler’s death, Admiral Karl Dönitz briefly assumed leadership of a crumbling German government. With most of Germany occupied and its military disintegrating, Dönitz authorized General Alfred Jodl to sign an unconditional surrender. On May 7, 1945, in Reims, France, Jodl signed the surrender to the Western Allies, which took effect at 11:01 p.m. on May 8—celebrated as Victory in Europe (V-E) Day. A separate, formal surrender to the Soviets was signed on May 8 in Berlin by Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel.
With the surrender, the war in Europe ended after nearly six years of unprecedented destruction and loss of life. The continent lay in ruins, but the defeat of Nazi Germany opened the path to reconstruction, occupation, and a new geopolitical order defined by the Cold War.
David Hogan is author of A Command Post at War: First Army HQ in Europe, 1943-1945; Centuries of Service: The U.S. Army, 1775-2005; and Raiders or Elite Infantry? The U.S. Army Rangers from Dieppe to Grenada. He is currently working on a biography of General of the Army Omar N. Bradley.
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!

The Battle of Okinawa 80th Anniversary

Glenn Flickinger leads a conversation about the Battle of Okinawa, the last great battle of the Pacific War that began 80 years ago this week. Joining Glenn is Seth Paridon, Deputy Director of the Mississippi Armed Forces Museum, former Historian  at the National World War II Museum in New Orleans, and producer and host of the “Unauthorized History of the Pacific War Podcast.” The discussion will focus on the role of the US Army.
The Battle of Okinawa, fought from April 1 to June 22, 1945, was the last major ground battle of World War II. It was the largest amphibious assault of the Pacific War, with over 180,000 US Army and Marine Corps troops landing on the island. The battle was characterized by brutal ground combat, entrenched Japanese defenses, and high casualties on both sides.
The U.S. Tenth Army, commanded by Lieutenant General Simon Bolivar Buckner Jr., landed on Okinawa on April 1. The initial landings were met with little resistance. Instead of contesting the beaches, Japanese forces under General Mitsuru Ushijima had fortified the southern part of the island, creating a network of bunkers, caves, and tunnels along the Shuri Line. This defensive strategy aimed to maximize American casualties and delay an invasion of Japan.
After securing the northern part of Okinawa with relative ease, U.S. forces turned south to engage the main Japanese defensive positions. The battle for the Shuri Line, which lasted from April to late May, was the most intense phase of the campaign. The Japanese employed heavy artillery, machine-gun nests, and suicide attacks to slow the American advance. The U.S. Army’s 96th and 7th Infantry Divisions, along with the 1st and 6th Marine Divisions, engaged in grueling combat, using flamethrowers, grenades, and explosives to clear Japanese bunkers and caves.
Key battles included the fight for Kakazu Ridge, where Japanese troops launched counterattacks and inflicted heavy casualties. The Americans responded with artillery and air support, gradually wearing down the defenders. Sugar Loaf Hill, another stronghold, saw intense fighting, with Marines taking the position after repeated assaults. The battle for Shuri Castle, the heart of the Japanese defense, was equally fierce. By late May, after weeks of continuous bombardment and ground assaults, U.S. forces finally breached the Shuri Line, forcing the Japanese to retreat south.
Despite their losses, Japanese defenders continued to resist in the southern part of the island. Suicide attacks, ambushes, and last-ditch defenses prolonged the battle. Thousands of Okinawan civilians were caught in the crossfire, with many forced by Japanese propaganda to commit suicide rather than surrender. The final phase of the battle saw General Ushijima and his chief of staff, General Isamu Cho, commit ritual suicide on June 22, effectively ending organized Japanese resistance.
The land battle for Okinawa resulted in over 100,000 Japanese military deaths, with only a few thousand captured. U.S. casualties were high, with over 12,000 killed and 38,000 wounded. The psychological and logistical toll of Okinawa played a role in the decision to use atomic bombs against Japan, as an invasion of the mainland was expected to be even bloodier.
The battle at sea, including the extensive kamikaze attacks on the U.S. Navy, was a significant part of the Okinawa campaign which we will talk about next week!

Civilian Women in Vietnam

​During the Vietnam War, American civilians played pivotal roles in supporting both military operations and humanitarian efforts, working through government agencies and nonprofit organizations. Thousands of these civilians were women, and we talk with several of them tonight!
Ann Kelsey was a UCLA graduate when she volunteered for the Army Special Services to serve in Vietnam as a civilian librarian. ​In Vietnam, Kelsey managed the U.S. Army Headquarters Area Command Library in Saigon before overseeing four libraries across Cam Ranh Bay, the Sixth Convalescent Center, Dong Ba Thin, and Nha Trang. These libraries functioned much like small-town public libraries, providing soldiers with access to books, records, and movies. They served as crucial sanctuaries, offering soldiers a respite from the war and a connection to the familiar comforts of home.
Kelsey’s role extended beyond managing library resources; she assisted soldiers with correspondence courses, helping them pursue educational goals amidst the chaos of war. Her dedication to supporting the troops highlighted the importance of intellectual engagement and morale-boosting activities during the conflict.
After her service in Vietnam from 1969 to 1970, Ann continued her career in library science, working in various libraries and specializing in automation planning and system procurement. She remained actively involved in veterans’ organizations and efforts to document the oral histories of veterans, ensuring that the experiences of those who served are preserved for future generations. ​wliw.org+2oralhistory.rutgers.edu+2news.ucr.edu+2
Ann’s experiences in Vietnam not only exemplify the critical role of civilian support during wartime but also underscore the profound impact such service can have on both the individuals who serve and those they support.​
René Johnson similarly felt a compelling need to understand the U.S. involvement in the war firsthand. In 1969, after graduating from Florida State University, she joined the American Red Cross’s Supplemental Recreation Activities Overseas (SRAO) program, becoming one of the esteemed “Donut Dollies.” ​
René was initially stationed at Chu Lai with the Americal Division and later at Cu Chi with the 25th Infantry Division. Her primary role involved traveling to remote fire support bases via helicopter, where she and her colleagues organized morale-boosting activities for the troops. A typical day entailed boarding a helicopter around six in the morning, visiting one or two firebases, conducting programs for at least five hours, serving lunch, and then returning to base to prepare for the next day’s activities. ​
The challenges were significant. René  recounted that visiting soldiers in hospitals, especially those with severe injuries, was particularly taxing. She grappled with finding the right words to comfort those who had sustained critical wounds, such as lost limbs or disfigured faces, and endeavored to reassure them about their futures. ​
Despite the hardships, René found her work deeply fulfilling. After completing her one-year tour as a Donut Dollie, she felt a profound connection to Vietnam and its people. This bond led her to return with the U.S. Army Special Services in the Service Club division, further supporting the troops and local communities.
Betty Burris felt it wasn’t fair that our men were subject to the draft and women weren’t. Betty applied to the Air Force but was told she’d have to wait for induction, probably due to a quota that limited the number of women in the military. As a USO volunteer in Philadelphia, she learned of the American Red Cross (ARC) Service in Military Hospitals program. Betty served in the ARC as a Social Worker from 1970 to 1978 in the Portsmouth Naval Regional Medical Center (Virginia), Valley Forge Army Hospital (Pennsylvania), 95th Evacuation Hospital (Vietnam) , Saigon Army Hospital (Vietnam), Wiesbaden Air Force Hospital (Germany), and the Philadelphia Naval Regional Medical Center (Pennsylvania).      
We’ll also talk with other women who served in Vietnam with the US Agency for International Development , Non-governmental organizations, and the American Red Cross. ​
We’re grateful to UPMC for Life  for sponsoring this event!