http://www.purpleheartcars.org/programs-services
http://www.thepurpleheart.com/events/
Tuesday August 7, 2012
Purple Heart Appreciation Day
This date honors General Washington’s 1782 orders establishing the Badge of Military Merit, the inspiration for today’s Purple Heart. The theme of the event this year will be to commemorate the 7oth Anniversary of the landings on Guadalcanal, the first major U.S. land Campaign of the War in the Pacific.
The National Purple Heart Hall of Honor Oral History program is a contributing partner to the Veterans History Project.
The Veterans History Project was created by the United States Congress in 2000 as part of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. The mission of the Veterans History project is to collect and archive the personal recollections of US wartime veterans to honor their service and share their stories with current and future generations.
When you share your story with the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor you can choose to have a copy of your interview sent to the Veterans History Project to be preserved by the Library of Congress. All interviews conducted at the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor are archived here at the Hall of Honor. Those interviewees who are interested in contributing to the Veterans History Project will have their interview preserved in the archives of both the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor and the Veterans History Project.
Once an interview has been archived and processed by the Veterans History Project a record of the interview is made available to the public in an online database and the interview is made accessible to researchers at the Library of Congress.
The stories of veterans need to be preserved. My Dad’s story during WWII was not accurately represented to our family as a whole until publishing my book, Reconciliation: A Son’s Story in November 2011. I waited until age 64 to know how he sacrificed for America’s freedoms during 66 months of continuous combat duty and long after the war from moral injury and PTSD. Without this knowledge my life would have continued with anger toward a toxic home life as a child. I can now look back and honor Dad for his service while recognizing the emotional damage of war and how it affects loved ones. It also reinforces the need for all of us to become much more aware and educated on the invisible wounds of war and how we can help. Take a moment and visit the above site, and learn more about the Veterans History Project. Don’t wait, tell your own story or the misplaced or forgotten story of a loved one who is no longer here to tell their story, or is unable to do so.
Steve Sparks
Author
Reconciliation: A Son’s Story
