American Military Vets Traveled to D-Day Beaches for Moving Commemoration
A story like this about these American Military Vets who traveled to D-Day Beaches is very inspiring to a Veteran such as my husband. You may not realize that Rog (who is the Rog in Life as Rog) is a US Army Veteran. He talks sometimes warmly and sometimes excitedly about the time he served in Germany during the late 80s and early 90s. When he talks about it, you would think it was just yesterday that it happened. In reality, it was over 30 years ago. So you can only imagine that a story like this touched that military part of his heart.
American Military Vets Traveled to D-Day Beaches
I have a remarkable, heartwarming story about a group of American Military Veterans: In September, 24 military vets and their travel companions traveled to Normandy with Road Scholar on their (Road Scholar’s) first-ever program exclusively for Vets and companions. They sent a photographer along with the group, and she captured some incredibly emotional photos of the group, like this one:
The nine-day educational program took these Road Scholars from Paris to the beaches of Normandy to learn about war history, art history, and the places where these two faces of France intersect. The itinerary was based on one of Road Scholar’s most popular European programs, The Best of Northern France: Paris and Normandy, but was enhanced to include additional military history programming, along with a visit to the Musée de l’Armée (Army Museum) in Paris and a field trip to the Mémorial de Caen, commemorating World War II’s “Battle for Caen.” The veterans were also presented with bleuet de France flower pins — France’s symbol for memory and solidarity with veterans, similar to the remembrance poppy used in the U.K. and U.S.
Visiting Omaha Beach To Walk in the Footsteps of WWII Soldiers
The most impactful day of this program was when the group of veterans visited Omaha Beach to walk in the footsteps of WWII soldiers. At the Normandy American Cemetery, they took part in a moving ceremony to pay respects to those who made the greatest sacrifice of all on June 6, 1944. Later that afternoon, participants had the opportunity to visit a virtually unknown American Memorial at a local cider maker’s farm.
“Many Road Scholar participants and alumni are veterans of the armed forces, and our military history programs from Gettysburg to Pearl Harbor are some of our most popular learning adventures,” says Road Scholar’s Chief Program Officer, Maeve Hartney. “We are proud to be able to honor the legacy of these American heroes who are attending the program at the same time that we honor the courageous veterans who fought in World War II.”
From everyone at Road Scholar: Thank you so much to the military veterans and their family members in the Road Scholar community for your service and sacrifices.
Parts of this post are credited to this post.
