USS New Jersey Battleship Event

Recently I was watching a mystery series set in Germany on the border of Poland. Another one I watched was set in Dresden. Both are part of a subscription to pbs.masterpiece that I took on amazon prime because I watch tv on my laptop not on television. For one thing I cannot tolerate any more commercials, and for another my declining vision and hearing make television difficult. I like amazone prime. Anyhow, I was struck with how it was just my lifetime ago that Dresden was a pile of rubble and ashes after the firebombing of WWII. Also, Poland, the aerial views show a place that looks as though it was never destroyed. Time marches on and like ants who have had a dog step into their anthill, we have repaired our damages, rebuilt and forgotten.

However, on August 14th, we will remember the end of the second World War on the Battleship New Jersey on the Camden Waterfront. There will be re-enactors, and even aerial events. Many if not most of the soldiers and auxiliary helpers who made it possible for us to defeat the Nazi onslaught and the demonic ambitions of the Japanese Empire are now gone. My father was in the navy in both the North Atlantic and the South Pacific. The last book he read before he died was about the Battle of Tassaferona which he witnessed from a US Navy Troop transport at sea. My mother served at the Navy Yard in Philadelphia. I was born in November of 1945, and I once had a film (now deteriorated, sadly) of my mother marching joyfully in August 1945 in a neighborhood Victory Parade, proudly waving a tall American flag and in her final months of pregnancy with me.

Everything started out new for us, my parents new marriage, new house, a little row home on Warnock Street in South Philadelphia, my father's new career as an ironworker, our new little family, my mother, father and me, and a new world full of relief and hope and promise.

I hope I can make it to the USS NJ Battleship Event, but my car is old, my knees are not good, and although I invited my sister and nephew, if they don't go, I won't be able to go either, so I don't know. I would like to go in memory of my parents and what they lived through.

Twice, in my old 'volunteer' days, I did a one woman re-enactment as a volunteer for the Red Bank Battlefield, as a WWII woman war correspondent. Red Bank Battlefield was the site of a World War Ii river defense emplacement and twice we hosted large and very popular WWII Re-enactments. A new book had just come out about a half dozen of these intrepid journalists, and I had photo of Margaret Bourke White, the photo journalist, and I copied her outfit and hair. By good luck, a 1947 German portable typewriter had been for sale for $25 at a local vintage shop to help with my re-enactment. I had also read a biography of Martha Gellhorn, a World War II war correspondent who had ended her marriage to Ernest Hemingway to go to Europe to cover the allied invasion. The beginning and the development of the careers of women war correspondents is in itself a great subject for a blog post, for anotenother time. Final note, I first learned about Margaret Bourke White through a photo of hers which appeared on the cover of LIFE Magazine when I was a child. My mother was a great suscriber to magazines, we must have had a half dozen that brought the world into a our little home every week and every month. I gobbled them up! The Saturday Evening Post covers by Norman Rockwell inspired my interest in Art.

Happy Trails! >p/> By the way, there will be a bluegrass concert FREE at Proprietor's Park in Gloucester City (which is on the rDelaware River front) on Tuesday the 10th of August from 7 - 9, so bring a chair and enjoy some fun music. The opening act will feature Michael Tearson - do you remember him from WMMR? He is a living rock and roll encyclopedia!