Click the link after each person’s bio to be directed to their video and/or podcast interview.

• WWII Army Veteran Irv Abramson talks about his service in the European Theatre, including being severely wounded during the Battle of the Bulge. Irv discusses his struggle with PTSD and how he finally revealed his war experiences to his family because of an assignment his daughter completed for high school. (Podcast)
• Wallace Alcorn dropped out of high school to join the Naval Reserve so he could be a part of WWII, then was drafted into the Army during the Korean War. After he completed seminary, he continued to serve for 28 more years as an Army chaplain. (Video)
• Through 41 missions over Germany during WWII, George Behling, Jr., escorted bombers in his P-51 Mustang and safely returned home. During the 42nd, however, his engine failed — forcing the 20-year-old to land in enemy territory and to take what he calls “the hard way home.” (Podcast)
• Curtis Bentley served in the Navy during WWII, supervising land-based mess operations during the Battle of Okinawa and later serving as an ammo bearer during the iconic engagement. (Video)
• Walt Bergonthal served during WWII with the Army Air Corps, attached to the 133rd AACS (Army Communications Systems). (Video)
• WWII veteran Bernie Bluestein was an art student in 1943 when he saw an Army recruiting flyer posted on the bulletin board at school looking for artists to form a new outfit. He ended up as part of a unit so secret that his escapades in Europe remained classified for nearly 50 years! Now free to tell his story, hear his fascinating tale of serving with the US Army’s 23rd Headquarters Special Troops — the “Ghost Army” — deployed successfully along the Rhine river. (Podcast)
• WWII Navy veteran Joe Borst, a Fireman 2nd Class who was aboard the USS St. Lo when it became the first major warship to sink after a direct hit from a Japanese kamikaze attack during the Battle of Leyte Gulf. (Podcast)
• As an Army field medic throughout the Battle of the Bulge, Staff Sergeant Peter Broustis saw firsthand the brutal realities of war. For his courage under fire, he received a Bronze Star. And yet, it was the atrocities he witnessed as part of the liberation force at Dachau that truly shocked him. As Peter says, “I saw man’s inhumanity to man.” (Podcast)
• Ray Brown served in the Army Air Corps during WWII. He flew 14 missions out of Italy as an aerial gunner, and was shot down on June 7, 1944. He was a POW at Stalag 4 and walked 630 miles after his liberation on April 26, 1945. (Video)
• WWII Navy Seaman Marion Burns discusses his time aboard the USS Franklin, a ship which withstood multiple attacks including a direct bombing hit in March of 1945 that resulted in the loss of more than 800 of his fellow sailors. Burns’ powerful story includes his ongoing struggle with PTSD and the impact his Honor Flight Chicago experience had on him. (Podcast)
• Army Corporal Jim Castellano served with the 430th AAA Bal. Battery B, a heavy artillery unit throughout Europe during World War II. He landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day Plus 3. (Video)
• Mel Copeland loves his country so much, he kissed the ground he walked on when he returned home from war during WWII. He wanted to serve his nation as a paratrooper or a pilot, but was quite literally too tall to fly — so he became a ground crew member of the famed Tuskegee Airmen. In this first season finale of our Honor. Thank. Inspire. podcast, Mel’s wisdom and deeply respectful approach to life shine through with a message that’s as timeless as it is timely. (Podcast)
• On Dec. 7, 1941, Navy Chief Yeoman James C. Dewitt‘s ship, the USS Antares, was towing a barge into Pearl Harbor in the pre-dawn hours. As they approached the harbor in search of the ship they were to transfer the barge to, they detected a submarine following the Antares. Since they were an unarmed ship, they received help from the destroyer USS Ward who located and sank the Japanese submarine. It became obvious this was a genuine attack and they notified central command. Soon after James and his shipmates were eyewitnesses to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Japanese planes began strafing the Antares as everyone was ordered below deck. Only one sailor on the Antares was injured in the attack, receiving the Purple Heart. Today, at 100 years of age and on the 80th anniversary of the attack, James still remembers the “Day Of Infamy” very well. He feels that his ship and crew do not get the recognition for their part in this historic event and enjoys sharing his story. “As long as someone wants to hear it, I’ll keep telling it,” he said. “A lot of young people don’t know anything about it. And I enjoy talking to people.” (Video)
• Len Dora served three years in the Army during WWII in the Pacific Theatre. (Video)
• Army Tech 5 Weyman Edwards served throughout Europe during World War II including at Monte Cassino and Fort Lucky Strike. (Video)
• Willie Ferba served as a Truck Driver in Japan during World War II. His service during the war was just the beginning of a lifetime of service to his community that continues to this day. (Video)
• Navy First Lieutenant Clelia Ginay served as an ICU nurse during World War II. (Video)
• WWII Army Air Corps First Lieutenant Alvin Goodman, Jr., flew 11 successful missions as a B-24 Bomber pilot before, while serving as co-pilot on his 12th, he was hit by flak and knocked out cold in the cockpit. In this episode of Honor. Thank. Inspire., Goodman describes the relatively little training pilots received before being thrown into combat, and his road to recovery after being wounded in midair. Goodman remained a flyer throughout his life, logging 25,000 hours of flight time during his career. (Podcast)
• Dr. David Grauer, DDS, joined the Navy late in WWII thanks to the urging of his father. After not seeing combat, he felt his military experience was not worthy of inclusion on an Honor Flight Chicago mission. For a man whose service to his country and his community extends from his time in uniform all the way into his 10th decade of life, he could not have been more mistaken. (Podcast)
• Charlie Hartley was a Corporal in the Army Corps of Engineers during WWII in the Pacific as a member of the occupation force in Japan. (Video)
• Howard Hill served in the Navy during WWII, spending two years about an aircraft carrier. (Video + Podcast)
• Army Air Corps Corporal Paul Hill served as an armament technician for B-24, B-29 and prop planes during World War II. (Video)
• During the Battle of the Bulge in the Ardennes, Army PFC Dick Idstein was wounded. The surgeon who operated on him asked “Do you want the bullet?” Dick said yes — and promptly sent the bullet home to his mother. That act preserved a tangible piece of history from the famous battle, and Dick used it during his career as a grade school teacher to illustrate the realities of war for his students. (Podcast)
• Navy Lieutenant Gladys Klauke served as a Navy Nurse during World War II. She recently celebrated her 100th birthday. (Video)
• Howard Levinson grew up in extreme poverty in Chicago and from a very young age experienced rampant anti-Semitism. He dreamed to fly, pushing through the obstacles of resources and ignorance to become a B-24 pilot in the Pacific at the tender age of 21. Though his crew feared he would be a “coward” because of his Jewish religion, he taught them a lesson in heroism they would never forget. Howard has continued to teach his entire life, including 75 years as a flight instructor. (Podcast)
• Army Air Corps Corporal Fred Maravilla served as a teletype operator and interpreter in Italy and Germany during World War II. He is a Mexican immigrant who got his U.S. citizenship during basic training, and went on to teach English to immigrants after the war. (Video)
• John Milton served in the Navy and was stationed at Pearl Harbor in the latter stages of WWII. He and his best friend — stationed onboard a ship in the Atlantic — wrote letters to each other. This exchange led to a tradition of letter writing in John’s family with his seven grandchildren, which he discusses at length in this interview. (Video)
• Mike Nussbaum is a World War II Army Veteran who served from 1943-46. His assignments included being chief of the message center for General Eisenhower; Nussbaum dispatched the official notification of Germany’s surrender on VE Day. He now is a professional actor on stage and screen, and is still working deep into his 90s. (Video)
• Army Air Corps 1st Lieutenant Elliot Rosenberg served as a B-24 pilot completing 35 combat missions during World War II. He was awarded the Air Medal with 3 Oak Leaf Clusters and the Distinguished Flying Cross. (Video)
• WWII veteran Hank Roberson was drafted into the Army from his home in the segregated south. He arrived in Normandy one week after D-Day assigned to the 957th Quartermaster supply company — part of what would become known as the vital “Red Ball Express” supply chain. In this timely episode, Roberson discusses being confined to a non-combat role because of racial barriers, his reaction to black soldiers like himself finally being allowed to fight during the Battle of the Bulge, and his experiences with discrimination during and after the war. (Podcast)
• Bill Shoop served as a teletype operator during the latter stages of World War II in Europe, first during the Battle of Bulge and later from the International Military Tribunal known as the Nuremberg Trials. Though he claims no special role in the Trials — “I just happened to be there,” he says — Bill Shoop was quite literally a witness to history and we are proud to tell his story. (Podcast)
• Dr. Paul Thomas served in the Army Air Corps during WWII. (Video)
• WWII Navy Veteran John Ullinskey discusses his involvement in D-Day and the Battle of Okinawa and everything in between: including his reaction to VJ Day and getting to meet the Pope! (Podcast)
• Jay Vandiver served from 1943-46 in the Army during WWII. He was part of the second wave of D-Day, and participated in the liberation of Dachau concentration camp. (Video)
• Bill Wagner was a Ships Cook Third Class in the Navy on the U.S.S. Yosemite all throughout the Pacific during WWII. (Video)
• In the absolute chaos that was Omaha Beach on D-Day, 20-year-old Ray Wagner found himself twice thrown into the water before scrambling onto the sand, death and destruction all around. He himself was wounded on that beach, but less than a month later he was back with his field artillery unit as they worked their way through Belgium, Holland, France and Germany — where his unit came upon the Nazi concentration camp at Dachau. Irascible and with language as salty as the water he was thrown into, Ray Wagner brings D-Day and the end of the war in Europe to vivid life in our 25th episode. (Podcast)
• Army Air Corps Corporal Bob Weiner served as a ground control radar operator in Alaska during World War II and the Korean War. (Video)
• Staff Sergeant Harold Weir was struck eight times by enemy fire in 1944, but survived his wounds, subsequent capture, and five months as a POW in the infamous Stalag 17. Harold returned home after WWII and for decades stoically endured mental and physical pain that often left him unable to sleep through the night. In 2011 — accompanied by his daughter, Donna — SSgt Weir traveled with Honor Flight Chicago to Washington, D.C., for an experience that proved to be life changing for all involved. (Podcast)
• Bob Wilcox landed on Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944: D-Day. He survived the landing only to be cut down on “Bloody Hill” near La Haye-du-Puits one month later. After nearly a year in the hospital, Bob came home to focus on family and his career as a notable optician prior to his passing in 2020. In this unique episode, Bob’s daughter Jeanny Shotas’ remembrances of her father are interwoven with Bob’s own words from an earlier interview. (Podcast)
• Emery Wolf served in the Army during WWII as a replacement troop during the occupation of Germany. (Video)
• Army SSgt Bill Zamzow served in chemical warfare during World War II, working to apply agents to clothing to prevent injury to service members throughout the Pacific theatre. (Video)