A week ago, during an hour or so layover at the airport in Baltimore, I noticed a movie camera and crew set up at the gate next to ours, along with many people with those big still cameras that journalists and serious hobbyists carry.
All were aimed at a gate expecting a Southwest Airlines flight to arrive.
What no-talent actress, famous for being famous, was due?
Instead, the flight that landed was filled with World War II veterans and, as they got off the plane, nearly everyone in the surrounding three waiting areas either stood up and clapped or clapped while seated.
One by one, the men and women deplaned, most of them accompanied by a young man or woman. Some veterans came in wheelchairs, others had walkers or canes and a few walked proudly off. Almost each of them had to stop at the restroom before joining the group to the side.
While I didn’t know it at the time, these men and women were part of the daylong Honor Flight, a volunteer group to take WWII veterans to Washington to the WWII and Vietnam memorials.
I have to say that these strangers touched me and made my husband and I think of our late fathers, both of whom were WWII veterans. Several years before he died, my father, James, had made for me a shadow box filled with a photo of him in his uniform, his medals, insignia, belt cord and whistle. It is above my desk and I look at it each day.
During this Memorial Day, it is time to think of the sacrifice that our war veterans made for us.
So what does this have to do with mysteries? It so happens I had just read one of the WWII mysteries about Billy Boyle from James R. Benn. His novels give us a glimpse of the Greatest Generation’s war memories. Benn’s novels immerse us in the time when these men and women were young and strong, hoping to survive that war and have a future in a free country when it was over.
Likewise, Charles Todd’s Beth Crawford series show us what it was like to go through WWI while Todd’s Ian Rutledge novels take us through the post-WWI years. Jacqueline Winspear’s Maisie Dobbs gives a view of how WWI changed the world, especially in terms of women’s rights, classism and emerging technology.
Benn’s next novel Rag and Bone will be published in September; Todd’s next Bess Crawford novel An Impartial Witness will hit the bookstores in August. Winspear’s The Mapping of Love and Death came out in March.
Yes, there are many other authors who have given us wonderful novels with a backdrop of WWI and WWII, and I hope you’ll leave a comment on them.
These novels bring us back to eras that most of us only know about from our relatives and old movies. These novels make sure that we never forget the sacrifices our veterans have made.
And a special thanks to James L. Cogdill and Stephen D. Hirschman.
