Welcome to the Greatest Generations Foundation Online Blog. The Greatest Generations Foundation (T.G.G.F) is a Denver based 501(c)(3) International non-profit educational organization that is committed to offering our country’s combat Veterans the opportunity to revisit the sites of their battlefield campaigns FREE of charge to the Veterans.

These courageous groups include generations of men and women who fought in World War I, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. Their dedication and bravery must never be forgotten, nor should the value of their deeds be allowed to disappear into the annals of history.

At this time, our primary focus at the time is with World War II veterans as we are losing these great national treasures at an alarming rate of nearly 1800 per day. This web log serves as place for us to update the public on our plans, our trips, upcoming events-trips and any associated events with the foundation.

MELBOURNE AUSTRALIA – As Melbourne’s CBD was plunged back into wartime with the filming at the weekend of the new Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg WWII film The Pacific, a service was held yesterday to honour the US servicemen who fought in the South Pacific.

A small group of US veterans, many of whom spent time in Australia during World War II, laid a wreath for their comrades at the Shrine of Remembrance yesterday.

Capt Dale Dye, who served in Vietnam, stood alongside the men yesterday.

Capt Dye is the senior military adviser for The Pacific. He said yesterday’s service was an emotional reminder of the close bond US and Australian servicemen and women shared during the Allies’ Pacific campaign.

“Everybody who lives in the free world owes these chaps a huge debt of gratitude,” he said.

Capt Dye said a visit to the the set of The Pacific at the weekend brought back strong memories for the veterans of Australia in 1943.

“The memories the scene invoked were enormous,” he said.

The US 1st Marine Division was one of the most famous to land in Melbourne during World War II.

Capt Dye said the men had been fighting in the Battle of Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands and were suffering from tropical diseases and malnutrition when they arrived.

“It was heaven for them because they had just come from hell,” he said.

“They were sent to Melbourne to rest and recuperate. But the minute they got a look at the Australian pubs and the Australian women walking around out they went.”

The US veterans were brought to Australia by the Greatest Generations Foundation, an organisation dedicated to helping veterans revisit the places they served.

DENVER — A Pearl Harbor survivor from Colorado is making his first journey back since that fateful day in 1941 that thrust America into World War II. Lew Weltzer, 89, left DIA Tuesday, bound for Hawaii with his wife and several other veterans who served throughout the Pacific theater.

Joe Weinmeier was a flame thrower at Iwo Jima. “It was a terrible, terrible experience,” said Weinmeier. Weltzer was aboard the first ship to fire back at Japanese dive bombers during the attack on Dec. 7, 1941.

He is looking forward to walking aboard the USS Arizona this year on the 66th anniversary. His best friend, Michael Givazzo, died on the Arizona during the attack. “In the safe of the Arizona, Michael had an engagement ring. And after he got back, he told me he was going to propose to this gal from California,” said Weltzer.

Weltzer’s wife is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran herself. The group will attend commemorations this Friday. They plan to return to Colorado on Sunday.

Lucky McGinty has lived a charmed life. On Friday, the nickname he earned as an -Army Air Corps bomber in World War II fit even better.

After 62 years, McGinty and fellow veteran Shep Waldman, also 83, finally received medals they had earned decades ago.

“I’ve been fortunate all my life,” said McGinty, shocked and touched after the surprise medal ceremony sponsored by the Greatest Generations Foundation.

During his service as a staff sergeant from 1941 to 1945, McGinty was never injured despite flying 29 missions over -Nazi-occupied Europe. His buddies started calling him Lucky after he stood up to an abusive higher-up and didn’t get court- martialed.

But the moniker was especially apt during one mission over Paris in 1943.

McGinty and his fellow airmen were trying to blow up a munitions factory on New Year’s Eve. The French workers had been warned to leave. McGinty armed the bombs, but they failed to eject from the plane. Fearing the bombs would land on civilians or destroy the plane, McGinty straddled the open bomb bay as the plane flew at 20,000 feet and pushed the bombs out.

Now, he has a medal to mark his heroism and to share with his five children, five grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren.

Waldman served as a staff sergeant in the Army from 1943 to 1945, surviving hand-to-hand combat and frigid conditions in the Battle of the Bulge, where he withstood more than a month without a proper coat, a change of socks or a warm meal. He participated in the D-Day landing on Omaha Beach and the Central Europe Campaigns, surviving several close calls. Once, while crossing a field near the Rhine, he dodged shrapnel spraying from anti-aircraft guns.

“The shrapnel was whizzing past my head. The next second, I could have had something blown out. I can’t explain it,” he said.

Another time, he was sneaking through a forest when he heard the click of an enemy soldier’s machine gun. He was sure he was dead. But he hit the ground and pressed his body as deep into the snow as he could.

Waldman, who is Jewish, takes pride now in knowing he helped end Nazi rule. Back then, all he wanted to do was survive. He said the worst times were before the battles as the GIs rode in trucks to the front.

Waldman remembers another young man who told him, “I’m never going to make it.”

Waldman tried to comfort the GI, but sure enough, the young man died two days later. Waldman had a different strategy. “I told myself, ‘I am not going to get killed.’ “

He returned to Denver, where he met his wife, had two children, and owned a jewelry store. He now has a great- grandchild on the way, along with a Bronze Star.

“This is just so unexpected,” Waldman said.

He had been in such a hurry to get out of the Army in 1945 that he left without collecting his medals. And the Army never sent them. For the past couple years, Waldman has begun speaking about the agony of war in his work for the Greatest Generations Foundation. He has been telling stories that he never even told his wife. To his surprise, Waldman discovered that sharing his stories gave him great comfort.

“People should know what happened in the war,” Waldman said. “How are they going to know unless we tell them?”

This Veterans Day, McGinty and Waldman will hold their newly-decorated chests just a little bit higher. McGinty never knew why he didn’t receive his medals. He was from Philadelphia and moved to Boulder, then Denver. About seven years ago, he sent in his records but never heard back from the Air Force.

Friday’s recognition of the men brought tears to the eyes of Brig. Gen. Eric Crabtree, who pinned the medals on McGinty.

“A number of people were never recognized,” Crabtree said. “As we approach Veterans Day and look at the conflict in Iraq, the young men and women there are not that different from the young men who went off to England to fight in World War II.”

Crabtree said that today’s military heroes stand on the shoulders of giants.

“Lucky McGinty is one of those giants,” Crabtree said.

McGinty received the Distinguished Flying Cross granted to those who distinguish themselves “by heroism or extraordinary achievement while participating in aerial flight.” He also earned an Air Medal.

Lt. Col. Laura Clellan presented Waldman with his medals.

“If it weren’t for what these guys did, I wouldn’t be able to wear this uniform,” Clellan said.

WINTERSCHEID, Germany, May 11 (Reuters) – It has taken more than 60 years, but gazing down a ridge over a former battlefield near Germany’s border with Belgium, Stan Tuhoski believes he has finally found closure from the greatest trauma of his life.

Now a frail 81-year-old, the Polish-American was just a teenager when he was caught up in the Battle of the Bulge, the bloodiest single engagement for U.S. forces in World War Two. Captured by German troops as they overran his raw, unprepared division in December 1944, he survived death marches and the horrors of prison camps, but returned home broken and verging on suicide.

“I would sit down and cry and cry and cry,” he said, explaining how he needed psychological counselling to allow him to stabilise his life and raise a family, including two sons who were to die in the American war in Vietnam a generation later.

But it took a return to the rolling forested battlefield of the Ardennes stretching through parts of Belgium, Luxembourg and France to come to terms fully with his wartime nightmare. “I can get it out of my mind now,” he said during a trip with 19 other American veterans organised by a U.S. charity.

“Before I kept thinking: what was I doing over there and why did I do what I did, you know? I’ve come over now and I’ve got a clear mind. I can go back and forget about it.

” Tuhoski, a former factory worker from Greig, New York state, was only able to make the trip thanks to Greatest Generations Foundation, a non-profit organisation established in 2004.

“In the United States, a lot of veterans in their 80s and 90s do not have the funding to return,” said Australian Timothy Davis, who set up the foundation having been inspired by a grandfather who fought alongside U.S. forces in the Pacific.

1,500 VETERANS DYING EVERY DAY The Colorado-based organisation has so far helped six groups of about 20 World War Two veterans return to Europe. Davis said that with America’s 1.8 million World War Two veterans dying at the rate of 1,500 a day, time was running out for those who want to make similar trips before they die.

“Before too long there is only going to be a small handful of veterans to keep the legacy alive,” he said. The latest trip began with a visit to D-Day’s Omaha beach in Normandy, France before heading eastwards to the Ardennes. The veterans will later take in the former German concentration camp at Dachau and Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s mountain-top headquarters in Berchtesgaden, in the Bavarian Alps.

Shep Waldman, a former staff sergeant from Denver, Colorado, said he had always believed himself unscarred emotionally from his combat experience, but years later suddenly experienced flashbacks in which he imagined himself back in battle. He said had never been able to afford to return to Europe and it had been an important catharsis.

“I wanted to see it one more time. I wanted to make sure it was OK — that I could walk along Omaha Beach and not see 5,000 ships from the invasion force out at sea or a sniper behind me.

” U.S. businessman Jeffrey Rosenthal helped finance the veterans’ return. He said it was important to keep the memory of what they did alive. “These gentlemen oftentimes have gotten lost,” he said.

“People often don’t want to hear their stories any more. They don’t realise that but for these men and others like them who gave their lives, we wouldn’t have the freedom we have today.

” Davis said the foundation had a waiting list of 11,000 veterans and aimed to expand its trips to Vietnam and Korea. But with each visit to Europe costing $3,000 per head it currently had only enough funds for two more groups. It aimed to raise more money from big corporations, not just in the United States, but in the European Union and the Pacific.

“We really need to look at what this generation has made for us,” he said. “It’s time for all of us to say thank you.”

Berchtesgaden, Germany – Jewish American veteran Shep Waldman knew exactly what he would do when he came face to face with the former enemy at the Eagle’s Nest, Adolf Hitler’s mountain retreat. Approaching a German veteran equally burdened by age and war memories, the former U.S. Army sergeant let out a friendly greeting: “Comrade,” he said. “Comrade,” pondered Alois Wuerzer, struggling with the English, a puzzled look on his face. Then his weary eyes lit up.

“Kamerad,” he repeated – which in German also means “friend.” Weathered hands stretched out, and one of the past century’s bitterest divides was bridged with a handshake.

The men were brought together amid the pristine peaks of the Bavarian Alps by the Greatest Generations Foundation of Denver, which seeks to give veterans the opportunity to visit old battlegrounds. Arranging a meeting with German vets was controversial, as was moving deep into Germany – a journey that chilled some of the 23 Americans and Canadians in the group.

Standing at the Eagle’s Nest, another Jewish American veteran could not bring himself to join in the reconciliation.

“I was not going to get involved in that,” said former Pfc. Cy Marmelstein, who had already taken a big emotional step by entering Germany again for the first time since World War II.

The encounter at the Eagle’s Nest took place May 12, and the veterans had already toured England, Normandy, Belgium and Luxembourg before heading to Germany – among thousands of U.S. veterans visiting Europe ahead of the June 6 anniversary of the D-Day invasion of 1944. Waldman said he knew Jews who were persecuted before the war.

“For two years, the rabbi, it was all he spoke about. It didn’t quite register at that moment. I could not visualize it,” he said, remembering his teenage days in Denver. He volunteered for the Army in 1943 and was sent to Europe. He found himself in a German village in street-to-street combat. Stepping around a corner, he stood face to face with a German soldier.

“I saw him, I had him, he was meat as far as I was concerned,” Waldman, 83, remembered. “His eyes popped, and that poor kid was shivering and shaking. I said, ‘I can’t kill him. No way I can kill a young man like that.”‘ Waldman told him to drop the gun and run. The German did. Even though Waldman, then 19, later killed a German in hand-to-hand combat, his compassion never left him. That made it easier to make peace with himself, he said, and enmity toward the Germans slowly left.

“I have gone through that,” Waldman said of coming to terms with the horrors of war and the Holocaust. “It took a long time, probably 20 years. Now, no more nightmares.”

But time has not dulled his awareness of what Jews faced under Hitler. On his last day in Germany, he went to a commemoration at the Dachau concentration camp and read the Kaddish, the Jewish memorial prayer for the dead.

“I am glad I went,” Waldman said. The handshake also left its mark in Kisslegg, Bavaria, where Wuerzer, 85, a former senior noncommissioned officer in the Wehrmacht, is enjoying retirement.

“I was so totally surprised” by the handshake, Wuerzer said. “They are good people. It is good for two enemies to talk to one another.”

MUNICH (JTA) – When Stanford “Shep” Waldman landed on the beaches of Normandy 62 years ago, he saw body parts of fellow soldiers washing onto the shore.

“You hated to look at it, but it was right there looking at you in the face,” said Waldman, a staff sergeant from Denver who was in an infantry unit.

He recalls thinking, “Am I going to get through today with all my parts in place?”

Waldman was among 22 World War II veterans who made a journey of remembrance organized by the 3-year-old, Denver-based Greatest Generations Foundation.

The soldiers returned to battlefields where they had struggled not only with their enemies, but with their own fears.

During the 13-day trip, the men viewed a V.E. Day re-enactment in London, walked on Omaha Beach — site of the D-Day invasion — revisited battlefields in France and Germany, and saw the Eagle’s Nest, Hitler’s retreat in Bavaria.

Filmmakers accompanied the group on its journey, which concluded May 13 with ceremonies marking the liberation of the Dachau concentration camp by American soldiers.

The goal is to ensure that the soldiers’ sacrifices are remembered, said Greatest Generations founder Tim Davis.

At Dachau, the veterans spoke with survivors and German students. They walked down the broad, stony path where the barracks had been, saw the camp’s crematorium and listened to speeches on the former “Appelplatz,” where the SS held prisoner roll calls.

“Hey Shep, what’s that poem you wanted to read?” Davis asked after the ceremonies.

“It’s a prayer – Kaddish,” Waldman answered, turning to face east, toward Jerusalem.

In flawless Hebrew, he recited, “May he who makes peace in the heights make peace in his mercy upon us all.”

Davis, 31, of Denver, asked some veterans if they would go back to Europe if all expenses were paid.

“Off the bat, most said no,” said Davis, whose grandfather, William Davis of the Australian Royal Navy, fought alongside U.S. Marines at Guadalcanal. “But after I asked would they go with other veterans together, most of them jumped at that.”

Davis told them there was one catch: “You must share your wartime experience with us on the battlefield.”

Many, like Waldman, had suppressed painful memories, not even discussing them with their children.

Davis found a supporter in businessman Jeffrey Rosenthal of Beverly Hills, who covered most of the trip’s costs — more than $3,000 per veteran.

Rosenthal said he had been moved to see young Europeans hugging and thanking U.S. veterans during a commemorative trip to Normandy in 2006.

“It was almost like they were rock stars,” he recalled. “You just don’t see that kind of gratitude in the United States. The veterans said it was the greatest day of their lives.”

The foundation, which has sponsored a handful of trips, next will seek out World War II veterans of the Pacific theater. It also aims to reach veterans of the wars in Korea, Vietnam and Iraq.

Davis said veterans of World War II “have one more mission and battle to fight – to release their demons after 60 years.”

Waldman was one of three Jewish veterans on the trip, along with Seymour “Cy” Mermelstein and Donald Golde.

In 1943, Waldman was working at a Denver jewelry store earning $6 per week when he and his boss enlisted. He hit the beaches of Normandy right after the D-Day invasion in June 1944.

Despite the shock of seeing dead soldiers, “adrenalin takes over and training takes over,” he said.

In April 1945, during a harrowing battle on the Elbe River, Waldman remembers coming face-to-face with a young German. Waldman had the advantage, but didn’t shoot.

“I told him to throw his rifle down,” he said, then told the German, ” ‘Now get the hell out of here!’ And he did understand.”

Shortly afterward, Waldman experienced hand-to-hand combat while trapped with two comrades behind enemy lines. Waldman killed one German soldier with his bayonet; his buddies killed the others.

“I never knew I could do it,” he said.

Mermelstein, growing up in Newark, N.J., was unaware of how Germany was treating Jews.

“I knew about the Nazis, though,” he said, recalling how a local German immigrant family hung a swastika flag in their window.

Mermelstein said he was “a young kid” when he went off to war in December 1942, “and I guess you take the invincibility attitude.” He fought with an infantry regiment and was among the soldiers to enter Buchenwald two days after its liberation.

Now 82 and living in Pembroke Pines, Fla., Mermelstein said he cannot forget “the stench.”

“It was thrust upon you just walking in,” he said, adding that the liberated prisoners “were in horrible shape.”

Mermelstein photographed piles of bodies, a whipping rack and a Nazi guard killed by inmates.

“They carved an SS into his chest,” he said.

Mermelstein gets riled when he hears people questioning whether the Holocaust happened.

“I had the camera, and I have the negatives,” he said.

Golde, a farmboy growing up in Michigan, was drafted at age 18 and fought in Italy. He said he’s still trying to get a Congressional Medal of Honor for rescuing a comrade who was severely wounded by a landmine.

When he learned about the Holocaust, Golde wished the Jews had fought back.

“I would have killed the guards” in the camps, he said.

DENVER COLORADO – They went to Europe the first time as young men, ready to fight and maybe even die in the biggest armed conflict the world has known. 

Today, they go back as old men, ready to find some perspective on their experiences in World War II, ready to revisit the beaches they stormed, the forests where they fought, the cities they bombed. Some, such as Stanford “Shep” Waldman, a veteran of the Army’s 83rd Infantry Division, saw ground combat in all five major campaigns in Europe.

Others, such as Elmer “Lucky” McGinty, fought the war from the air, surviving 29 missions as a radio man and gunner in a B-17.And still others, such as Edward Tipper, experienced battle as one short, incredibly intense experience: just six days from the moment he parachuted into Normandy on D-Day until he was horribly wounded by mortar fire as his unit fought to take Carentan, France.

They are among 25 World War II veterans – 15 of them with Colorado ties – who embark today on a two-week trip to England, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, Holland and Germany. The trip was organized by the Greatest Generations Foundation, a Denver-based nonprofit organization started for the sole purpose of returning military veterans to their fields of battle.“I personally feel that these men have one last battle to fight, and that’s the battle to find closure, and the battle that they’ve been waiting to fight for six decades,” said Tim Davis, the Australian-born president of the foundation and one of those who started it.Today begins the group’s sixth trip to foreign battlefields. For the foreseeable future, the trips will be focused on World War II veterans. The reason is simple: the youngest of them are in their 80s, and time is running out.In the years ahead, Davis said he expects to begin returning Korean and eventually Vietnam veterans to the battlefields where they fought.

This morning, Waldman, McGinty and Tipper will step onto a United Airlines flight at Denver International Airport to begin the journey. Other veterans will join the group during a layover in Washington, D.C.

Waldman, who landed at Normandy a week after D-Day, has never returned to Europe.

“I’m really anticipating this,” he said.

A veteran of every major campaign in Europe, he suffered frozen hands and feet during the Battle of the Bulge and recently filed a claim with the Department of Veterans Affairs.

“I was telling the story to the lady at the VA,” he said. “I swear I wasn’t in that room anymore. I was back there in Normandy. I’m not an emotional man, but all of a sudden, my eyes were welling up and I was back on the beaches of Normandy again.”

Waldman, 82, was sent to see a therapist, who told him he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. Now the Denver resident is looking forward to taking another step toward conquering it by actually revisiting the places where he fought.

So is McGinty, 83. He hopes that he’ll be able to see the air base in Horham, England, where he flew 29 missions as part of the Eighth Air Force. The chance to return is something the Denver resident relishes, although, like many of his generation, he is reticent to talk about his battle experience as anything special.

“Nobody thought anything of it,” he said of his military service. “It’s just what happened in your life. Even people back home had to do their part, too, so it was no big deal, you know?

“I think just getting together with all these guys is going to be wonderful.”

Tipper, 85, of Lakewood, may not have seen the duration of battle of others, but he and his unit have been remembered in ways that many others have not.  A member of E “Easy” Company of the 101st Airborne Division’s 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, he and his comrades were memorialized in the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers.

And although he returned to Normandy for the 50th anniversary of D-Day in 1994 – “one great, massive traffic jam,” he called it – he’s looking forward to a quieter trip this time.

And to spending it with other veterans.

“There’s a sort of a bond between all people that have been in combat,” he said