Ghosts of Arlington Podcast

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here The military veterans interred at Punchbowl are as varied as the Hawaiian Islands themselves. In fact, their final resting place is about the only thing today's ghosts - the father of tiki culture, an college football legend, the first Chinese-American fighter pilot, and Barak Obama's grandfather - have in common. This week's...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here The military veterans interred at Punchbowl are as varied as the Hawaiian Islands themselves. In fact, their final resting place is about the only thing today's ghosts - an astronaut, an Olympic silver medalist turned professional wrestler turned Bond villain, a horticulturalist turned Sinaloa cartel drug mule, and the godfather of mode...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here This week, everyone's worst fears come true and Ernie Pyle's luck runs out. He lands with the Marines on Okinawa, a short time after the start of the bloodiest battle of World War II, but all of the 100,000 Japanese defenders had moved inland and did not oppose the landing. After a few uneventful days with the Marines, Pyle returne...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here This week, war correspondent Ernie Pyle hits the beach in Normandy France just one day after the D-Day invasion, sees the allies break out of the Normandy peninsula after six weeks of hard fighting, is on hand for the liberation of Paris, and decides he has had enough of war. But try as he might, he can't really stay away and soon finds...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here After retuning to Italy from his R&R, Pyle gets a tip from a pre-war friend - who also happens to be the senior US Army air forces commander in the Mediterranean - that he should return to London because the long awaited invasion of western Europe is going to happen sooner rather than later. It's nice to have friends in high places!...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here The US invades Sicily, and just like he was for North Africa, Pyle was there to bring the news of the front back to the home front.  But just as it does for everyone, Pyle's combat experiences begin to take a toll on his well being so he agrees to take a break, return to the US, and get some rest and relaxation. He finds little of both....

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here With the Allied invasion of Africa on, Ernie Pyle's fame back in the US as "the only reporter to bring the war home to us" begins to grow. In just six month's time his column is pick up by more than one hundred additional newspapers and his daily readership increases by nearly six and a half million people. He continues t...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here When World War II begins in Europe, Pyle is desperate to cover and is allowed to go to London during the Blitz where he covers one of the largest incendiary raids of the war - instead of taking shelter in a basement he stands out on a balcony! When the US enters the war, he returns to England and then heads to Africa to cover Operation Torch...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here After Ernie Pyle married his wife, Jerry, the couple quit their jobs and drove around the US in a Model T Ford, camping out and falling in love with the Southwest. When they got back east several months later they were broke, but looking to travel again. Pyle was invited back to his old newspaper in Washington, DC, but new responsibilities,...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here Born to tenant farmers in rural Dana, Indiana, Ernie Pyle looked for any way to get out of the Midwest farm country he feared he might toil away his life in. When World War II ended a month after he joined the naval reserve, he did the next best thing - enroll at Indiana University. While in school, he studied communications and journalism,...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here This week we wrap up the discrition of the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at the Punchbowl crater in Oahu, Hawaii and then we will see just how closely Punchbowl and Arlington are related when in December 2023, a young sailor killed when the USS  Oklahoma capsized during Pearl Harbor, and whose remains were just recently identifie...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here This week we take a look at the history of the National Cemetery of the Pacific - also known as Punchbowl - in Hawaii, in a temporary segment I like to think of as Ghosts of the Pacific. The Ghosts of the Pacific Theme is Ukulele and Love Birds by emjaydabayou , with a few Waves of Hawaii added for ambiance. The Ghosts of the Pacific Transit...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here Over the last few weeks we have lost two US astronauts from the golden age of space exploration - Ken Mattingly and Frank Borman - and since I spent 42 weeks on the space race, I felt it was appropriate to take the time to eulogize those two explorers today. If you listen to end, you can find out the connection between Frank Borman, Buzz Ald...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here In what may be my final episode of 2023, this week we will see the end of Joseph Medicine Crow's amazing story of counting coup on the Germans and only realizing after he returns to the reservation following World War II, that he has fulfilled all the requirements to become a chief, and becomes the first Crow warrior in the reservation...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here Due to holiday and work schedules, I have decided to split the final longer episode about Joseph Medicine Crow into two shorter parts. This week, we learn a little about Medicine Crow's childhood - breaking and racing horses and leading history from pre-reservation chiefs, but also going to the so-called white man school and learning En...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here November is National Native American Heritage Month here in the United States. With that in mind, I talk about the history of that celebration, and talk a little about the Plains Indians and the Crow Nation. What does any of that have to do with Arlington National Cemetery? Not much. But it has a lot to do with Joseph Medicine Crow, a World...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here On November 14, 1965, the US Army had its first major battle against North Vietnamese regular troops in the Ia Drang valley near the Cambodian boarder. The first two days or the three day battle was depicted in the 2002 Mel Gibson movie We Were Soldiers . It wasn't until the movie came out that I learned that I had spent the last decade...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here In 1966, Bernie Fisher saw a member of his flight, Lieutenant Colonel "Jump" Myers, get shot down while providing close air support for about 350 special forces soldiers overrun by more than 2000 enemy fighters. The explosion lead Fisher to believe his comrade had been killed on impact, but when he saw Myers exit the aircraft and d...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here After his unexpected deployment to Vietnam, Chief Novosel is assigned to a medical evacuation unit and over the course of two deployments, evacuated more than 5500 soldiers off the battlefield, include 29 South Vietnamese troops under heavy fire, an action that would eventually lead to him being awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. Toda...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here This week, we begin the story of Army Aviator Chief Warrant Officer 4 Mike Novosel, a guy who was too short to fly according to the military standards of the day, was forced out of the service against his will, and who eventually took a demotion, all because he wanted to pass his 20+ years of aviation experience on to the next generation of...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here A recent work trip to South Korea opened my eyes to the Collins family's four-person, two-generational association with the Second Infantry Division and the Korean Peninsula, so today I share at story and one other that I learned about at the Second Infantry Division Museum on Camp Humphreys in Pyeongtaek, Republic of Korea. Today'...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here It has been a long time coming, but after 1,891 days in captivity, Nick Rowe became one of only 37 prisoners to successfully escape from Vietcong prisons and make it back to friendly forces. This is the culminating event of his five years to freedom. The helicopter that picked him up radioed ahead and a large crowd gathered to welcome him ho...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here Lieutenant Rowe's circumstances change drastically and he unexpectedly finds himself the lone prisoner in his prison camp. After spending four years with other American POWs, he has to adjust to these new surroundings and hope that he has the mental fortitude to withstand the Vietcong's ramped-up indoctrination sessions all on his...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here As Lieutenant Nick Rowe's time in captivity moves into its thrid year, it becomes more difficult for him and his American colleagues to stave off the illness and disease that comes with extreme malnutrician, which will claim its first victims in this episode. We will also see what happens to Captain Rocky Versace after the Vietcong real...

I'd love to hear your thoughts - send me a text here The American POWs are split up as the Vietcong continue their reeducation efforts to get them to confess to "crimes against the Vietnamese people." Knowing his health is headed south, Lieutenant Nick Rowe decides he needs to try to escape before it's too late. Sure, escape is risky, but even if he dies in the process, he figur...