Area Veterans Reflect on Veterans Day

That Veterans Day falls on 11/11/11 this year may lend a certain symmetry to the day, but most veterans see no magic in those numbers.

For Wilton resident and Korean War era veteran Ken Dartley, the day seems politically poetic.

“Even as a teenager growing up during World War II, I always wondered why they picked a time certain for World War I," Dartley said. "Seems crazy. One of the young men from Wilton was killed on the last day or close to it. To some extent the issue is legal—that is exactly when did hostilities cease ? On the other hand if you were on the front line…would you fire at the enemy? If you fired after the time should you be charged with murder? That is a hell of a 'Oops.' ”

Originally called Armistice Day, Veterans Day commemorates the cessation of hostilities between the Allied nations and Germany after World War One. That armistice went into effect on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918. It was first commemorated on Nov. 11, 1919.

This Veterans Day comes 10 years after terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and 10 years since the first U.S. boots hit the ground in Afghanistan. It comes weeks after President Obama announced all troops in Iraq are coming home and the same year when U.S. Navy Seals killed Osama Bin Laden. This Veterans Day, many who served in earlier conflicts see changes—most notably in the way service members are treated.

“I’m glad the way veterans are treated now—there is no demonstrating against troops like Vietnam or forgetting them like Korea,” said Dartley. “Today I think we honor our veterans.”

Today, Veterans Day honors 21.8 million veterans, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Of those, 1.6 million are women and 9 million are 65 and older. 

Dartley said he's seen U.S. armed forces that went from being filled with a mix of enlistees and draftees to all-volunteer.

“We grew up and were mostly teen agers during World War II so most of us had family in World War II and it was only a few years away from our personal thoughts,” Dartley said. “We then looked at serving as part of growing up. So that’s different in my mind from today’s all volunteer Army.”

The draft ended in 1973, and was replaced by Selective Service System in 1980. In 1989, Congress ordered the Selective Service System to establish a method of drafting “persons qualified for practice or employment in a health care and professional occupation.” That system remains.

The creation of the all-volunteer military has created a warrior-civilian divide, some say. Less than one percent of Americans serve in the armed forces, according to the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

Because it’s an all-volunteer military many of today’s soldiers serve multiple tours of duty. That disturbs and worries Don Hazzard, a Wilton resident, who served with the Navy Seabees in Vietnam in 1968.

“It has been 10 years since the terrible tragedy on 9/11 and I feel now as I felt then, when the president hastily sent troops into Iraq, I said to myself, 'Here is the beginning of another Vietnam, and it is another political war, run from Washington, not the battlefield,' ” said Hazzard, who is also commander of American Legion Post 86 in Wilton. “Like the war in Vietnam ended, I feel this war will end, with no closure, and the Taliban live on.”

When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, New Canaan resident Marvin Newman, 86, was a student at Amherst College in Massachusetts. Together with about 150 fellow students, Newman enlisted. He was sent to boot camp at the Sampson Naval Training Base in Sampson, NY.

“That was the worst part of the Navy aside from typhoons and kamikazes,” Newman recalled.

After boot camp, Newman was assigned to an LST 1109 where he served as quartermaster second class in the Pacific Theater. He remembers being at sea and dealing with 80 foot swells storms that split boats in half.

“I was so young I didn’t realize we were going to invade Japan,” Newman said.

Like Newman, Dartley enlisted—sort of. He was living in Texas working in a print shop earning $28 a week. When his draft number came up Dartley quit his job and went home to see his parents. 

After learning it might be a year before duty truly called, Dartley chose to formally enlist. Soon he was bound for training in Fort Benning, or, as he calls it, the “Benning School for Boys.” Then, just before Dartley was to be shipped overseas the war ended.

“Me and my parents were relieved. At the time the life expectancy for a second lieutenant in the infantry in Korea was two days,” Dartley said. 

Newman now freely talks about his service, even speaking with New Canaan students on Veterans Day. That’s another change for some of these veterans.

“When we got back from the war we just got back to studying,” Newman said. “Nobody ever talked about their service.”

In Weston, there will be plenty of talk about service on Friday. Each year the schools stay open on Veterans Day so students may interact with Weston veterans. This year Chris Lang, a Weston resident, will be the keynote speaker at the town’s ceremony. Lang is between deployments; he is home for a month after serving in Iraq before going back to Afghanistan.

It’s soldiers like Lang that Hazzard wants people to remember.

“I would like to remind everyone to take a moment to reach out and thank a veteran for their service to our country,” Hazzard said. “If you come upon a military person in an airport or anywhere, reach your hand out to them and just say thank you for your service, without them we would not be living with the freedom that we all have today.”