In 2002, Bruce Allen and Jack Schwartz contacted Jim Honeycutt.
Members of the very active, wide-ranging Y’s Men retirees’ group, they asked the Staples High School media instructor for help with a project.
Both had served in the military during World War II. They wanted to produce a video, filled with memories and reflections of 18 WWII combat veterans. Already, the ranks of service members from that war were thinnning.
His father was in the navy. Honeycutt was happy to help.
Plaques, memorials and a statue fill Westport’s Veterans Green, across from Town Hall.
As he interviewed the nearly 2 dozen veterans, Honeycutt was stunned. One man had waved at a low-flying airplane. The pilot waved back. Then he torpedoed a battleship in Pearl Harbor.
Schwartz himself bombed Japan, at the same time an atomic bomb was dropped to the north. He saw the sky filled with colors.
“The stories are so important to remember,” Honeycutt says.
So earlier this year — now retired from teaching — he took the DVD, re-edited it, and uploaded the finished product to his personal YouTube channel.
There’s almost 3 hours of content. As Veterans Day approaches, Honeycutt invites “06880” readers to honor all who served America by hearing their stories. Just click below.
I will watch this with great interest. My father in law was in the tank service in Europe for 4 years, his family was told he was “missing in action” but his the girl friend to become his wife of 63 years never gave up hope that he would return home. He was captured twice by the Germans and escaped twice. He returned home to to carve his name off a memorial for the war dead in his home town, marry his sweetheart, take off his uniform and go to work, and raise 4 daughters never to say a word about the horrors he saw and endured……….these men are our greates generation.
Wow. Amazing and important oral history by some truly Ys men. Great that Jim decided to put this up on You Tube. I Watched the first two speakers so far and look forward to sitting down with my family to watch the entire this Veteran’s Day weekend. Look forward to sharing with my father-in-law as well. Watch out Ken Burns.
All Veterans deserve our deepest respect. Think of them and their sacrifices next time you whine about inconsequential matters.
Some very special men in this video including my father, Bill Hart, and some of his good friends. Thank you for creating, re-editing and saving this, Jim Honeycutt, and to Dan for sharing it. I’m going to send it to my family as a keepsake.