PoliticalComments Off on Ohio Man Honors Fallen Soldiers With Snow Sculpture
Mar132015
Awesome!
An Ohio man honored our fallen soldiers with his annual snow sculpture: a 14 foot bald eagle, with an American flag hung on its back. Here’s the story:
Roger L. Pugh says every year he makes some sort of snow sculpture, but this year he decided to take it to the next level and turn it into a tribute to fallen soldiers. He says he worked on it a little each night after work, and he’s happy with how it turned out: a bald eagle wrapped in the American flag, with a grave with boots and a wooden gun and helmet in front.
“It’s a tribute to our fallen soldiers, the ones that covered my back and taking care of my butt for a lot of years,” Pugh said. “If it can put a smile on somebody’s face, or make them think about our soldiers, hey, mission accomplished.”
Kinda puts your measly 5 foot snowman to shame, huh?
Celebrity patriots a rare breed but Jimmy Stewart more than fit the bill.
Jimmy Stewart’s original attempts to join the Army were rejected because he did not meet the height and weight requirements to become a fighter pilot. Unfazed by the setback, Stewart found an alternative route by joining the U.S. Air Corps, where he would quickly rise through the ranks and become a Colonel in just four years. He won virtually every Medal of Honor available and helped fly crucial missions in Nazi Germany.
While he was building his reputation as an actor, the rest of the world was about to go to war. German occupation in numerous countries in the early part of 1940 led Congress on September 16, 1940 to pass the Selective Service Bill, “the draft”, this bill called for 900,000 men between the ages of 20 and 36 to be drafted each year. Stewart’s draft number was 310. When his number was called and he appeared at Draft Board No. 245 in West Los Angeles in February 1941, the 6’3” Stewart weighed only 138 pounds, 5 pounds under the acceptable weight level. He was turned down. Stewart wanted to fly and serve his country but by May of 1941 he would have been too old to get into flight school. He went home ate everything he could that was fattening and went back and enlisted in the Army Air Corps, he passed the physical with an ounce to spare. While others tried to avoid the draft, he actually wanted to serve in the military. Later he would actually campaign to see combat.
Jimmy was already a licensed pilot. Interested in aviation as a child, he had taken his first flight while still in Indiana from one of the barnstorming pilots that used to travel the Midwest. As a successful actor in 1935 Jimmy was able to afford flying lessons. He received his pilot’s license in 1935 and bought his first airplane. In 1938 he gained his commercial pilot’s license. He often flew cross country to visit his parents in Pennsylvania, navigating by the railroad tracks.
In the military, he was to make extensive use of his pilot’s training. In March 1941 at age 32, he reported for duty as Private James Stewart at Fort McArthur and was assigned to the Army Air Corps at Moffett Field. To comply with the regulations of the Air Corps proficiency board, Stewart required additional 100 flying hours and bought them at a nearby field, at this own expense. He then took and passed a very stiff proficiency board examination. In January 1942 Stewart was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant. He was then sent to Mather Field in California as a twin engine instructor this included both the B-17 and B-24. Much to his dismay, Stewart stayed stateside for almost two years, until commanding officers finally yielded to his request to be sent overseas. In November 1943, now a Captain and Operations Officer for the 703rd Squadron, 445th Bombardment Group of the Eight Air Force, he arrived in Tibenham, England. In March of 1944 he was transferred to the 453rd Bombardment Group at Old Buckenham. While stateside, Stewart flew B-17’s (The Flying Fortress). In England he flew B-24’s (The Liberator) and did so for the remaining years of the war. Stewart’s war record included 20 dangerous combat missions as command pilot, wing commander or squadron commander. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross with two Oak Leaf Clusters, The Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters, and the French Croix de Guerre with Palm. At the end of the war he had risen to the rank of Colonel. After the war he remained with the US Air Force Reserves and was promoted to Brigadier General in 1959. His tuxedo and dress blues with all the correct medals are on display at The Jimmy Stewart Museum. He retired from the Air Force in 1968 (mandatory retirement age) and received the Distinguished Service Medal. When the war was over, Jimmy returned home to a hero’s welcome in Indiana, Pennsylvania, immortalized by Life magazine cover that showed him posing in full uniform on top of a building with the golden cupola of the Indiana County Courthouse in the background draped with a “Welcome Home Jim” banner and a large lighted wooden “V”ictory sign – his father is said to have put these up.
Charles Plumb was a US Navy jet pilot in Vietnam. After 75 combat missions, his plane was destroyed by a surface-to-air missile. Plumb ejected and parachuted into enemy hands. He was captured and spent 6 years in a communist Vietnamese prison. He survived the ordeal and now lectures on lessons learned from that experience!
One day, when Plumb and his wife were sitting in a restaurant, a man at another table came up and said, “You’re Plumb! You flew jet fighters in Vietnam from the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk. You were shot down!”
“How in the world did you know that?” asked Plumb.
“I packed your parachute,” the man replied. Plumb gasped in surprise and gratitude. The man pumped his hand and said, “I guess it worked!” Plumb assured him, “It sure did. If your chute hadn’t worked, I wouldn’t be here today.”
Plumb couldn’t sleep that night, thinking about that man. Plumb says, “I kept wondering what he had looked like in a Navy uniform: a white hat; a bib in the back; and bell-bottom trousers. I wonder how many times I might have seen him and not even said ‘Good morning, how are you?’ or anything because, you see, I was a fighter pilot, and he was just a sailor.” Plumb thought of the many hours the sailor had spent at a long wooden table in the bowels of the ship, carefully weaving the shrouds and folding the silks of each chute, holding in his hands each time the fate of someone he didn’t know.
Now, Plumb asks his audience, “Who’s packing your parachute?” Everyone has someone who provides what they need to make it through the day. He also points out that he needed many kinds of parachutes when his plane was shot down over enemy territory – he needed his physical parachute, his mental parachute, his emotional parachute, and his spiritual parachute. He called on all these supports before reaching safety.
Sometimes in the daily challenges that life gives us, we miss what is really important. We may fail to say hello, please, or thank you, congratulate someone on something wonderful that has happened to them, give a compliment, or just do something nice for no reason. As you go through this week, this month, this year, recognize people who pack your parachutes.
It’s said that a man’s word can affect the course of history. Certainly a man with a microphone can. Mainstream media lies. Without accountability their power can influence national debate, shift momentum, and destroy a person’s good name. All affecting history.
When one of their own repeats a lie for 12 years but is excused with the help of the media’s herd mentality, tragic distrust and despondency blankets our land. The veil is torn, however, with the revelation of exaggerated, self-centered falsehoods like NBC’s perpetual lie that belittled our soldiers and their truly courageous missions. The face of that network’s news lied about combat experiences in Iraq and then with false humility accepted the title of “war hero” while the press ignores, disrespects, and often destroys the good name of our true war heroes. To me, that’s like soiling sacred ground.
After having his lies exposed by troops who were there, this news anchor’s recent acknowledgement of “mistakenly” repeating his grandiose story for more than a decade makes this sad tale even worse because even in his explanation he is deceiving.
Brian Williams equated himself with our honorable vets and troops in combat boots with a made-up story of his courage and victorious return to the make-up chair strolling in his Bruno Maglis back to read his TelePrompTer’s twisted scripts, and we were forced to swallow it all. That was then. This is now, when we can thank God for new unconventional media that scatters the deceiving herd that would do this to America.
An enlightened public grows more confident everyday knowing we do not have to settle for mainstream garbage insulting our intelligence as it’s sold as “news”. The American public deserves so much better and it’s encouraging to see so many rise up and demand better. It’s why we’ve turned off the old, we turn on the new, and we’ll never look back.
Leftist media and their minions in politics tried for too long to fundamentally transform America with their shared assumption we would fall in line and bend our backs as they rode us with reins to control our individual sovereignty. America said enough is enough and we strengthened our spine so we could fight for freedom, sometimes requiring battles against our own leaders. Remember Hillary Clinton, always seeking the title of Commander in Chief, using a harrowing account of coming under enemy fire in Iraq? (http://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/2015/02/05/sharyl-attkisson-brian-williams-not-alone-hillary-clinton-lied-about-being-shot-at-in-bosnia/) Of course it didn’t happen. But a protecting press excused her with sympathetic descriptions of an exhausting schedule – evidently a schedule having more negative impact than that of her equally busy male competitors, because it was blamed for her dramatic lapse in recalling a near-death war zone experience that was really all made up. It goes without asking, would the press have done the same with others we can think of, had she or he “mistakenly” claimed taking on such danger in their drive to win an election?
Taking the Williams and Clinton examples, it also goes without asking, if they lie about things like this, what and who else do they lie about?
Be encouraged though, America! The demise of old media is a result of us saying, “No more.” It shows you what you can accomplish as a free and exceptional nation! We demand truth in reporting by shifting a market away from those refusing to give it. We demand adherence to our Constitution by taking back our government from those refusing to do it. We demand the fundamental restoration of America by refusing to bend to anyone dangerously transforming it.
Thank you for that! And thank the Lord for blessing us with the wisdom and wherewithal to get this done.
