Preserving art, history and World War II memories – EP285 Tango Alpha Lima

Number One New York Times bestselling author Robert Edsel is the author of “The Greatest Treasure Hunt in History: The Story of the Monuments Men.” The book served as the basis for Academy Award winner George Clooney’s 2014 film, which stars an ensemble cast including himself, Matt Damon, and Bill Murray. 

Edsel, whose father served as a Marine during World War II, is one of the world’s foremost advocates for art preservation and the recovery of cultural treasures missing since World War II.

The Monuments Men and Women were the soldier-scholars who helped save many of the world’s great art and cultural treasures from the destruction of war and theft by the Nazis.

Other topics in this episode include a wounded Navy veteran’s “Alive Day,” how Sesame Street characters are giving back to the military community and more.

• Learn more about Robert Edsel
• Buy "Remember Us" on Amazon
• Join the USA 250 Challenge
• Watch Robert Edsel at the 2025 American Legion National Convention
• Poem: The Young Dead Soldiers Do Not Speak
• Netherlands American Cemetery in Margraten
• The Forever Promise Project
• Army Monuments Officer Training
• American Legion Oratorical Contest
• Sesame Street helps military kids build healthy habits
• Sesame Street: Fun Recipes with Cookie Monster! 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
This is the Tal podcast. Welcome Alpis.

(00:30):
I hope you are ready because we've got a great show for you
today. Our guest is the number one New
York Times bestselling author Robert Edsel.
He wrote The Monuments Men, which served as the basis for
the Academy Award recipient George Clooney's 2014 film.
I don't know. If you haven't seen it, you need
to check it out anyway. Robert is one of the world's

(00:50):
foremost advocates for art preservation and the recovery of
cultural treasures missing sinceWorld War 2.
For the last 20 years of his life, he is dedicated to the
meticulous research of the Monuments Men and Women, the
soldier scholars who helped saveso many of the world's great art
and cultural treasures from the destruction of the war that and

(01:12):
the theft of the Nazis. In the course of his work, Mr.
Edsel located and interviewed 21Monuments officers, including
three Monuments women and dozensof family members.
I am so super stoked for this guest.
Super excited I I love people like this that dig into history

(01:33):
I'm I'm really excited for this one as well and and maybe I'm a
little more introspective than normal today.
So today on the day that we're recording this is September 17th
and this is the 21st anniversaryherdiversary 21st alive day of
my injury. As most of you have heard, I was

(01:58):
injured in Iraq in 2004 on September 17th, and I want to
take a moment to talk about whatthe Legion means to me.
One of the first things that that really made a difference in
my life the moment I got hurt was reaching in my cargo pocket
to get my tourniquet and feelingthat little pin.

(02:19):
I had a little pin of my daughter.
I didn't pull it out. Nothing dramatic or anything
like that, but it was a reminderright there that I had people at
home that cared. And when you have people that
care, everything just gets a little bit easier.
So for me, that little pin that I felt in my pocket was a
reminder that that I had people at home that love me.

(02:41):
And I want to let you know as somebody who's been through some
things in their life that I loveyou.
I love you Stacy. I love you Holly, who's muted,
and I love Adam, who's gallivanting in DC.
I think it's so important. And having the Legion behind
you, it feels like a family. When you go to these national

(03:01):
conventions, I, I, there's people that I hug people that,
that, that mean the world to me.And having a support system
wrapped around you is the only way you get through hard things.
And when you've got a good support system, it doesn't feel
like you're reaching out asking for help.
You just have the help. You've got people that care.
And so if you don't feel like you've got that, it might be

(03:23):
time to get more involved because the best way to heal
your own spirit, and my experience is to is to serve, is
to continue to serve. And when you need to take a
break, you take a break. But that's what really makes the
most impact in my life. That little girl, that little
three month old daughter is now 21 and I have a 18 year old and

(03:43):
a 13 year old and a three-year old because I have no self
respect for my bank account. But that's just how things roll.
But you know, each one of those,those kids is a part of my
support system. And, and, and Alphas, we're,
we're a part of your support system.
We're here to, to entertain and educate and show love and, and

(04:04):
continue to serve. So thank you for giving us an
opportunity to do that. Joe, I am so glad you survived
that ordeal to come out on the other side.
I know it was a an uphill battlefor a long time, but I'm I'm
glad that things are in a place where you can share what
resilience looks like. You are the face of that, and I
love you too. And uphill battles are very

(04:25):
tough for one legged people so. Well, you, you made it look
easy. OK, Alba, please stick around.
We'll be right back with Robert Etzel right after the break.
Join me in the American Legion'syear long celebration of our
nation's 250th birthday. We're celebrating America with
USA 250 Challenge. What is the challenge?

(04:45):
USA 250 Challenge is built on three important features we know
well, physical activity, mental Wellness and community service.
Join the challenge today. Visit legion.org to learn more
and register for $30.00. For your registration fee,
you'll get to choose the commemorative T-shirt while
supporting Veterans and ChildrenFoundation.

(05:06):
I look forward to celebrating the special birthday celebration
with you. Today we are joined by Robert
etzel #1, New York Times bestselling author of five non
fiction books. In 2022, the United States Army
and the Smithsonian Institute made Mr. Etzel an honorary

(05:28):
graduate of the 1st Army Monuments Officer Training
Program, an idea Mr. Etzel advocated for nearly 20 years.
Mr. Edsel is also the founder and chairman of the Monuments
Men and Women Foundation, recipient of the National
Humanities Medal awarded by the President George W Bush.
Robert, such a treat to have you.

(05:48):
Welcome to the show. Thank you, Stacy and thank you
Joe of. Course, so I, I want to dive
into to how we got where we're at right here to start with.
So can you give me a little bit of background on where you grew
up and what made you decide you were going to write 5 incredible
books? I may be insulted about the
insinuation that I've grown up. I'm not sure I have.

(06:12):
Finally, another chosen child. That's what I call it, a chosen
child. Welcome.
Look, I had an ambition to be a professional tennis player.
So this has been an an experiment for 60 some odd
years. It's gone quite awry, but I'm
driven by curiosity and I was a good tennis player, really good,

(06:34):
but I wasn't going to be great. I could see that.
And I wanted to work. I liked working.
I like working very much. And I took the first job that
was offered to me, which was working for guy in the oil and
gas exploration business. I did that for a few years,
started my own company after that and then when I was 39 had
a chance to the next thing to dois have a public company.

(06:54):
And I just saw that as a, a danger sign for me personally
because I realized 39 becomes 59with a snap of the fingers.
And I didn't want to be someone that at at 59 saying, you know,
I always thought about doing so and so etcetera.
But I never had the time. And I had people saying, yeah,
but you're going to make so muchmoney if you do this.
And I said, well, I didn't get into it for the money.

(07:16):
I got into it because it was thefirst job that was offered to
me. And it turned out that it
involved money, but that wasn't my motivation.
And yeah, I like money as much as the next person, but I have
an acute understanding of how precious time is.
That's the real commodity. And I have always been my, the
currency of my life has been meaningfulness.
And there's nothing wrong with trying to make money.

(07:38):
There's nothing wrong if that's your passion, you know, go do
it. But I wanted to see what else I
could learn about what else I could do.
And I just felt like if I have apublic company, I'm never going
to have the time to find out. And I didn't want to have that
happen. So I start, I sold the business
and I made sure that I had a jobfor every one of my 100
employees that that the acquiring company offered none

(08:00):
of them jobs. That was the thing I was
proudest of my business career. And then started studying art
and architecture. I lived in Florence for a while.
I was reading a lot. And one day I wondered, well, if
Europe was so beat up by World War 2, how did all these works
of art survive? And who are the people that
saved them? And I didn't know the answer.
And I started asking people I'd made friendships with that were

(08:20):
European. And I said, I don't know, That's
a great question. What's the answer?
And I said, well, you live here,you should know.
And everybody said, I never thought about it.
And I said, well, I didn't either.
So that's what led me on the quest to go find monuments men
and women that were alive. And I found 21 of them that I
got to know very well and delivered the eulogies of six or

(08:41):
seven of them and then wrote several books, including The
Monuments Men, which Clooney made into George Clooney, made
into a movie. And that gave us a platform to
do these other things that we wanted to do to make sure the
men and women got received the Congressional Gold Medal.
Because when they came back in 1950, we were engaged in a Cold

(09:01):
War. And no one ever said thank you
to try and help finish their mission because there's still
hundreds of thousands of works of art missing that.
And, and the foundation, Monuments Men and Women
Foundation has found 40 some oddobjects.
In fact, we had a big announcement last week.
I went up to Newark. OH, and stop the auction sale of

(09:22):
two paintings that have been looted from French collectors
that were in a safety deposit box.
So that work continues. But the most important thing was
to preserve their legacy and putit to use so in future conflicts
and places like you all have been in Iraq, that we are
mindful that if we're going to go into those places, we have a
duty to protect the cultural treasures of those countries.

(09:45):
And if we don't, then you betterlike reading negative headlines
on every paper in the world for the failure to do so.
And that's what happened to us in 2003.
And it's not the service men andwomen's fault.
I mean, you all take orders. It's the people that issue those
orders. And so the whole idea of the
movie was, if everybody knows about this, the likelihood of

(10:07):
leadership not knowing or makinga mistake diminishes greatly.
And then we can do a great job like we did during World War 2.
So that that's what drove it all.
I, I just want to say I love people with questions And, and I
have a theory that all the good documentaries that we've ever
seen weren't people with answers.
It was people like you with questions.

(10:29):
And so I, I just wanted to jump in and say that and, and then
I'm done. But I think I love the
questioner. I think, you know, when we try
and come up with answers all thetime and you know, in our tribal
world right now, of all the arguing that goes on, they're
usually not the, the, the best question hasn't been answered,
right? When you get the best question,

(10:50):
then we can engage with people of goodwill because there's
grenade throwers on both sides, you know, in the extremes.
And that's not where progress exists.
Somewhere in the middle, center left, center right, doesn't
really matter. That's where progress.
But you've got to ask those penetrating questions, and
sometimes they're not particularly complicated to to
think of, but the answers aren'tnecessarily easy to address.

(11:14):
Yeah. Well, actually I want to talk a
little bit about because you recently spoke to the audience
at the 106th American Legion National Convention about the
Forever Promise Project, which is committed to connecting Dutch
grave adopters with 100% of the next of kin of those nearly
10,000 American heroes that wereburied or honored in the Walls

(11:35):
of the Missing at the Netherlands American Cemetery.
And for those who who are listening, who haven't heard
about this or weren't in attendance or didn't watch the
live stream, can you share a little bit about what that is,
what the project is, what the motivations are?
Tell us a little bit. Happy to do so.

(11:55):
Speaking to the, I don't know what the number was, 5 to 7000
veterans that were in attendanceat the American Legion
convention in Tampa a couple weeks ago, one of the great
privileges of my life, I had a chance to talk about my most
recent book which came out in May called Remember Us.

(12:16):
As everyone says, what's the name of your book again?
Remember us. You can't forget that, right?
Well, anyway, Remember us. And that derives from a poem by
Archibald McLeish that I think is the most moving, poignant and
precisely accurate description of what men and women who have
served in combat and have lost men and women who have served in

(12:37):
combat period, especially those that have lost their lives, he
says to the a couple of short passages are deaths are not
ours, they are yours. They will mean what you make
them. That is really what it's all
about here. And so there are in our
cemeteries overseas, those that are here in the United States,

(12:58):
silent witnesses to what we're doing today, you know, did.
Are we validating the sacrificesthey made then by what we're
doing today? That really is the core of it.
I was clued here. Getting curiosity got me into
trouble. In 2015 when we had the
Congressional Gold Medal ceremony, Speaker Boehner had

(13:18):
asked us to organize this. And I said, well, you, this is
what you do. We don't do that.
And he said, well, you know all the family members, so we need
you to get them all here. So we had about 200 family
members of monuments, men and women and four that were living
that were still there. And one of the the nephew of the
of the one American monuments officer killed during combat,
World War Two, who happens to beburied at the Netherlands

(13:41):
American Cemetery. Walter Hutchhausen wrote me to
say for sure I'll be there. By the way, I just got back from
from London and I had a wonderful meeting with Freda.
And he sent a photo of this woman with this crown of white
hair. And I thought, I don't know any
Freda. Well, how does he think I know
of Freda? And then I realized I remembered
there was a young girl who was 19, who was Dutch, who wrote

(14:03):
Harvard in October 2000. Sorry, October 1990 Nineteen 45
to say that we were good friendswith Captain Hutchhausen and we
were devastated to find out he'dbeen killed and I'm hoping you
can connect me with his mother so I can let her know that I
walk 5 miles to and from the cemetery several times a week to

(14:24):
put flowers on his grave. Harvard responded and she
started a pen pal relationship with that family and adopted in
a figurative cinch since the grave and continue to take care
of it. I wrote about that in monuments
men. It never occurred me to try and
find her. And in 2015, I learned she's
still alive. So I started a pen pal

(14:45):
relationship with her. And I said, I want to come meet
you. And I said to my wife, we need
to go see this lady. We're going to do it in 2016.
And I met with her on Memorial Day.
And my wife said, do you have ambitions?
And I said ambitions like what? She said, are you going to write
another book? And I said, no, you're crazy.
No. Never, Robert.
I'm not going to do that. I just want to go.

(15:05):
She's the last civilian to see this guy before he was killed,
and he's a key figure in my In Monuments Men book.
I feel duty bound to meet her. So we went and she had all these
photographs on her table. She was there on September 13th
at 19 years old when the first American tank passes her house
and they're liberated 81 years ago on Saturday, 81 years ago

(15:30):
Saturday. And she looked at me with tears
streaming down her face at at 9,at 88.
She was 88 then and said, I saidto my dad, Poppy, look, these
American boys have come all the way across the ocean to save us.
And she said, are you familiar with Netherland American

(15:50):
Cemetery? And I said, yes, yes, I've been
out there. Are you sure?
Yes, I'm very sure. I've been there.
So you know about the grave adoption program?
And I said, the what? And she said the grave adoption
program. And I said, I don't know what
you're talking about. Well, I was embarrassed.
I was stunned. I asked her some questions and
she didn't know the whole detail.
And I let there and thought, well, that sounds like something

(16:10):
I should know about. And in the course of researching
it, I learned at the end of World War 2, the net, the
American Military Cemetery Margraten, which is what it was
called, had 17,800 and boys and a few women buried there.
It was our largest World War 2 cemetery by far.
It's where all the 9th Army casualties went that were on the

(16:34):
drive to get to Berlin. And General Simpson promised
nobody's going to be buried on enemy soil.
So they round trip them on trucks to bring them back across
the border to bury them in Margraten.
All of our casualties from Market Garden that were buried
in temporary cemeteries in SaunaMullenhook, predominantly 101st
and 82nd, were later exhumed andreinterred at Marg Rotten.

(16:58):
So that's how it got so large. The Dutch were neutral in World
War One. They hadn't lost their freedom
in 100 years. They were devastated to be
invaded. They did not have a resistance
network. They didn't have an underground
resistance network. They didn't have a black market.

(17:19):
And when the Americans liberatedthem, they were so grateful.
And they were trying to find an answer even before the war was
over. How do you thank your liberators
when they're no longer alive to thank?
And they came up with this graveadoption program.
So by the second Memorial Day, May 46, all 17,800 boys and

(17:40):
girls that were buried there hadsomeone in the Netherlands that
had said I will be the adopter which meant they committed to be
out there in their birth and death date.
Memorial Day, Veteran's Day, many other days put flowers on
the grave and if they had the name and address of next of kin,
send a photograph of the grave because it was as close as the
American families, many familieswould ever get to being with

(18:02):
their boy. The when the American Army and
government refused to provide the next of kin information, the
wife of the mayor of Maastricht,a mother of eleven who was 38
years old, got on an airplane, the first plane she'd ever flown
on. Her name was Emily and flew to
the United States on a mission of mercy.

(18:24):
For five weeks, she lived in a different home every day.
She was making this trip up as she went.
She went to Washington and many of people were impressed there,
including a young congressman from Texas, Lyndon Johnson.
She flew to Dallas, of all places where I live, and she
went to American Legion halls. We have photographs of her
there. She stayed with the families of

(18:46):
she stayed with young war widows, with families that have
lost a boy. And she's tried to see as many
people as she could. She was on radio program.
She was quite the the figure media wise by the time she went
back to the to the Netherlands and she was gathering names and
addresses and she said to all Americans she met with leave
your boys with us. When the election notices come,

(19:09):
leave your boys with us. We'll watch over them like our
own forever. And here 81 years later, I was
just there 48 hours ago for the liberation concert. 81 years
later, all 10,000 graves of the boys and four women, 8300
graves, 1700 names on the walls and missing every one of them

(19:30):
has been 100% adopted for 81 years.
It's the most moving, heartwarming story.
In many ways, the Dutch are moreAmerican than we are because
they haven't forgotten. They know where their freedom
came from, and they have turned this cemetery into a classroom
filled with young people. It's so inspiring to go there.

(19:51):
So I wrote the book, but I tell people writing books is not a
fun process. I spent eight years of my life
researching this thing. I write books because I'm a
messenger and I think there's a message that needs to be
conveyed. And it begins with a book that
hopefully leads to a film to then lift up our nation with a

(20:11):
great story. And the story here is there are
10,000 adopters for all of the graves and walls and the names
in the walls in the missing. They're only in contact with
2000 American families because they don't know how to find the
other 8000. So the Monuments Men and Women
Foundation entered into a joint venture with the Dutch
Foundation for adopting Graves, and we called it the Forever

(20:32):
Promise Project. That's what Emily told all the
Americans. So we are, we have a website,
foreverpromise.org. We don't charge anybody for the
work that we do. People can go there and there's
a searchable database of everybody that's buried in the
cemetery in Margraten. There's a short questionnaire
that pops up. What's your relationship?

(20:54):
Are you aware there's a grave adoption program?
Are you in contact with your adopter?
If not, would you like to be? Will you give us permission to
share your contact information with our colleagues in the
Netherlands so they can match upThe adopters that have been
taking care of these craves all these time, some in their 4th
generation and make these introductions and they are so
heart warming when they happen. I was over there two weeks ago

(21:17):
to introduce the the niece to the young couple that has been
taking care of her uncle for thelast six years and they are the
4th adopter of this grave. So that's what it's all about.
You know, it's to finish the jobthat the Dutch started.
And as you'll recall, Stacy, I raised the question of my

(21:38):
remarks at the American Legion Convention.
Why don't we Americans have a grave adoption program for
Americans, by Americans? So that is, that's something
that we're in the early stages of working on to take the
template the Dutch have handed us.
And to just add one, one other thought there, I learned about

(22:03):
our freedom, where it came from,from my dad, who was a World War
2 veteran Marine in the Pacific.He was also a product of the
Depression. I think everybody that's my age
±10 years or, or certainly older, that's where they learned
it from. They didn't learn it in school.
But we also talked civics in school.
But we're not going to that. That models dead in the next few

(22:25):
years. We're going to lose all the
World War 2 veterans. And we don't teach this in
school. We don't teach civics anymore.
So how, how, why should we be surprised that a 20 or 30 year
old in the United States thinks freedoms like the water in your
bathroom, you just turn it on and, and there it is.
But it's not like that. We know it.
You guys have paid the price forit.
And, and that's not right, in myopinion.

(22:47):
That thing Tom Brokaw talked about, the connective tissue
between civilians in the population and those who serve
in the military that has been damaged and it's frayed.
And we should be concerned aboutthat as citizens.
So I'm doing what I think I can do to engage other people.
And I think the Grave adoption program in the Netherlands is a

(23:09):
beautiful place to start. Yeah, I, I think though, that
you get to a point to where if, you know, everyone's parents
fought when they grew up and even some of us that that felt
like they grew up in a decent home or whatever.
And, and I think the goal a lot of time is when when you serve,
when you're the goal to make America as peaceful and as

(23:33):
strong as it can be, that peopledon't realize what it takes to
get there. Like you mentioned, I feel like
that a lot of times they've justseen it for so long and this is
how it's always been. And that that you have people.
And of course, I won't go into details because I'm not trying
to, but you know, you have people that support people
across the world that don't agree with their lifestyle and

(23:55):
stuff like that. And it's scary to me.
It doesn't make me go, Oh, they're so dumb.
It scares me because it's like, you just don't get it.
And you know, in in your research you've done, you know,
you've, you've learned the context of these people.
And I think that that's something that we don't
naturally do. We take the information and we
cherry pick out of that what we want in order to confirm a bias

(24:18):
that we have most of the time. And, and I think that when you
truly ask a question willing to be wrong is when you grow.
And so in your research for remember us, you, you used a lot
of never, never before seen letters, Diaries and other
historical records were some of those from the other side where

(24:40):
where I I'm just curious if you got some perspective or context
that surprised you. And, and just just to say this
also and, and, and Stacey can definitely confirm this.
Pushing through adversity is oneof my many soft spots.
It's one of the things that'll get me a little teared up.
I just love to see people who are strong.

(25:02):
And so I'd love these kinds of stories, but I would love, if
you've got, you know, if you want to share any of this, I
would love to hear anything thatyou'd be willing to share.
Was any of this a surprise to you when you started reading
these letters and learning aboutall these things from a one on
an individual basis instead of the top down view that we get
from history? I think you're, you're right.

(25:26):
This is why, you know, the the most important thing I do as a
storyteller, I have two responsibilities as I see it 1
to Get the facts right. And part of the reason it took
eight years of research is my key fellow researcher, Dr. Seth
Givens, who's the who's an outstanding, he's a leader of

(25:47):
the he's just a phenomenal researcher.
And we both committed upfront ifit took an extra year to do this
book because we fact checked everything a second and third
and fourth time. That's what we were doing
because we felt a duty to the men and women that are buried
there to make sure we got their story right.
The second thing that I think's responsibility is context.

(26:08):
Facts are dangerous if you don'tprovide context and there's so
many people that don't have the context.
I have to make sure you need to know all these things before you
as I'm telling you this story tomake sure that I don't want to
tell you what to think from this.
You're able to do that, but I have to give you the correct
facts and I have to provide the right context so you can then

(26:30):
decide what do you think. I'll tell you in the epilogue my
opinion, but I'm not going to tell you while I'm telling the
story because I want you to be engaged in it and figure it out
for yourself. In answer to your question, have
were there surprises? more than I can tell you, less
so from the German side than theuniqueness of what's taken place

(26:52):
there. When we when I first started
researching this and all throughout the process, I
couldn't find a company where inthe world where foreigners were
venerated by people of another country.
It was just astonishing to see something like this that began
organically from the beginning. And as I read these letters,

(27:16):
the, the people there suffered losses.
So they suffered like the parents did, because a lot of
these boys that lived in their homes, because when the
Americans came and then the winter weather came and it was
the that horrible winter, 4445, they couldn't stand seeing them
bivouac. So they put them in their

(27:37):
houses, they put them in barns. They didn't have any food.
The American army had food. They cooked it for them.
They didn't have any laundry detergent.
American Army had that. They washed their clothes for
them. And when some of them didn't
come back, they had letters thatwere unsent that they didn't
have the address for, which created this yearning to be

(27:58):
connected to the American family.
So that kind of care and concernby people that weren't even
Americans a lot. 1 of the great surprises was I interviewed at
least a dozen people that told me they've never seen a black
human being before. They were stunned when the
quartermaster troops came in or the black tankers.

(28:21):
And I write I have one of each of those in my book.
Another words, the black, the quartermaster troops, they dug
the graves. My opinion, worst job in the
war. There are no coffins.
They buried the bodies or body parts.
They had to touch them all the time.
Dangerous job, as you know, because a lot of people had live
ammunition. Sometimes their body was frozen

(28:43):
and they had a hand grenade in their hand with a pen pulled.
So they had to remove all the all of that, then go through and
there they called it a strippingline.
It was a whole process of takingall the identification marks
out. They took the dog tags.
One was placed in the mouth. If there was a head, the other
was nailed to the cross because there was this functional need

(29:04):
to get guys in the ground. That's what it was all about.
It's not a if we have casualties, it's war.
You will have casualties. Someone's got to do it.
And it took multiple guys to lift these bodies up and put
them in. They put them in bed sacks and
then dug the grave one after another.
It took these guys sometimes a whole day to dig one grave.

(29:26):
The monotony of it, not knowing when's the war going to end, how
long are we going to be doing this tough, tough, difficult,
depressing job. But they did it, and they did it
with pride. Whether the soldier was white,
black, etcetera. Another thing that I brought
visibility to, how do you choosewhich characters you're going to
tell about when you got 17,800 to choose?

(29:48):
But I wanted to remind people, you know what?
We're a country of immigrants. We were, we are, we always will
be, never going to undo that. And in World War Two, it was a
good thing we all work together.I wanted to emphasize that
without ever telling anybody I've done this.
I picked a Native American 82nd Airborne.
I picked a chaplain. I had black gravedigger, but I

(30:11):
also had a black tanker because I wanted you to see how what
great they were fighters just like white guys.
Didn't matter. They were there.
And as you guys know better thanme, you know, there isn't any
atheist in the foxhole and therearen't any colors in the
foxhole. You just want to make sure
you're covering your your buddy's back and he's covering
you. We had a guy out of Central

(30:32):
casting, Medal of Honor recipient, 101st Airborne.
We had twins that the Army Air Force in their infinite wisdom
allow twin pilots. They allowed them to fly as
pilot and copilot in the same airplane and that'll never
happen again. But it did then.
So I had AI. Had a German Jew that immigrated
to the United States with his family when he was 13, right

(30:55):
before his bar mitzvah, right before crystal knocked, who
volunteered to go in. He was a Richie boy.
He spoke German fluently. He was an interrogator and
intelligence officer. So not everybody makes it.
Some don't, some do. But it represents the country
were were, this is who we are. And all these people work
together for this remarkable outcome.
And it's something we should celebrate and remember.

(31:17):
We can still do that today, but we have to make sure we approach
it in a very different way than we are today, yelling back and
forth at each other. I think it's such a good
reminder, Robert. Thank you for that.
And I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on this
book. It sounds so incredible.
I'm wondering you, you sparked like as you were talking.

(31:38):
I know that there are missing inaction names on the wall, right?
Has there been any instances where maybe a farmer's tilling
and you know how dirt rises? Has there been any instances
where remains have been discovered, identified,
repatriated any or maybe interred added to the cemetery
in your recent? All the time, all the time.

(32:00):
There's only been one ad, I think in the last 20 years, but
for the most part, if it's the DPAA and the Defense Department
POWMIA group under General KellyMcKee, they do fantastic work.
They're constantly going into graves of unknown soldiers and

(32:22):
extracting DNA to see if they can make identifications.
And they have made a number. And recently in the last year or
two, they've had the most recentidentification of a name that
was on the walls of the missing at at in the Netherlands.
And this happens at at our othercemeteries as well.
When it happens to to a name on the wall of the missing, they

(32:45):
put what they call a rosette, which is about 1/4 size brass
Laurel that they hammer into theStonewall next to the name,
which indicates that some remains were found.
They contact the family, which they probably have already done
to it to have DNA samples to make the connection.

(33:05):
And the family typically wants those remains brought back to
the United States. That's where I think 90% plus
end up. If it's in the grave.
If it's a grave, then the same process.
And they may, they may reinter the body or they may choose to
leave the remains there. So this is ongoing work.
This is not, you know, we're notwriting about a history that's

(33:27):
in the past and is a static, farfrom it.
It's continuing to be done. And it's just heartwarming, both
from my research back to the war.
We had grave registration officers and others for three
years in Europe, combing every single foot of Europe, going to
farmhouses. Did you see a parachute come

(33:49):
down? Could it have fallen in a water
tank or a pond or a well where where we can't see it?
Did you bury somebody and not tell anyone because you were
afraid the Germans would would arrest you for doing it?
They interviewed people, they put up Flyers, newspapers,
trying to find every single thing.
My underlying point about remember us, and part of the

(34:11):
purpose for writing the book is we talk about, we see it all the
time in movies. You know, no one gets left
behind. We're going to go get everybody.
OK, great idea. I agree with that.
But what's the point if we go get everybody and then we forget
about them? I mean, the point's not to go
get them per SE. It's to get them and make sure
we venerate their service and that they're remembered.

(34:33):
That's happening in the Netherlands because the people
there who are the beneficiaries of their service and sacrifice,
they take their kids out and they stand them.
They from schools and some of the adopters there are schools,
the entire schools, 1 adopter and they take the classes out.
They stand them in front of the the Cross or the Star of David
and they point out to them, whatever you're thinking,

(34:54):
whatever you want to say is the freedom that you have that the
American boy or girl that's buried here once had and gave up
so that you'd have a chance to have yours.
Now. We don't do that here.
And I think that's a big mistakein our country, not engaging
younger people. I mean, guys my age, I'm 68,

(35:16):
yeah, it'd be great for the 68 year olds knew that too.
But that's not how we change thecountry.
We change the country by building an army of young people
that understand this and get them engaged like the Dutch are
doing. So it's a beautiful way of
making sure these servicemen andwomen that made this
immeasurable sacrifice are always remembered, not just for

(35:38):
what they accomplished, liberating and defeating Nazism,
but who were these individuals? Who were these people?
I write about 11 of them, but that's 11 out of 17,800 that
were once there at this one cemetery of our 14 World War 2 /
2 overseas cemeteries. You know, it's, I think an

(36:01):
educated military is, is, is something that I think our
military has always taken pride in in a lot of ways.
And, and I, I don't believe that's slipped every time.
I, I, I thought that, you know, that I was talking to somebody
who, who just served to, to, to serve.

(36:24):
I, I, I, I'll never forget. I was having a conversation with
a gentleman and he went off on European history like, and I'm
talking he went through World War 2 deeper than I had ever
even imagined it existed. And and I realized in that
moment that there are there's somuch talent in our military.

(36:46):
There are authors, there are fantastic musicians.
They're historians, They're people that that have lived
through things because not everyone walks around saying,
hey, I grew up around horses or fainting goats or whatever
interesting thing there might beabout someone.
And I think when you get to see a little bit of that, when

(37:07):
people slow down. And I think that's one thing I
really like about the American Legion is that you get a group
of these these young men and women who've been through things
and have lived these lives and they have a common almost family
like bond. Like you mentioned, There's, you
know, no atheist in, in color inin foxholes.

(37:27):
There's just family. And that never goes away.
And I think when you're a kid and you have those moments when
you hear Lean Lee Greenwood beltout, you know, for the first
time that you feel that with everybody.
And then something happens and we push that away.
And patriotism can be such a badword now.

(37:49):
And it doesn't have to be because I think that anybody
who's willing to put work in patriotism means this is what we
can do together. It's not everything's perfect.
Stop trying. And so I, I, I think that it
comes down to those individual men and women.
It comes down to, to people withquestions like you.

(38:11):
And so the American Legion, I think is, is founded on, on the
these pillars of strong NationalDefense, you know, Veterans
Affairs and, and the patriotism that we talked about, but like
the good, healthy kind of patriotism that people are
willing to work to receive. And remember as you write about
the forever promise forged between two nations.

(38:31):
And that that really resonates with me.
And I think it will with our listeners as well, because I
think it's important to be somebody that can be relied on
and and to take care of those who made it possible.
So in this era that we've touched upon a little bit of
global division, what lessons doyou think we can glean from the
decades long bond between like the Dutch and their American
liberators? Like what?

(38:53):
What are some things that you think that that we can sort of
glean from that? Great question.
I want to answer that and I alsowant to tack on a comment about
what I think about the American Legion now having spent three
days, three days down there. You know, I, I have been

(39:13):
determined when I got when I started this journey.
And it's only got my commitmentshave only been stronger to do
everything I could do to avoid the work that we're doing to
honor these men and women to ever enter the arena of politics
because they deserve better thanthat.
I would say that if our politicsare happy and everybody loved

(39:34):
each other, I for sure would sayit in the divisive arena in
which we're in now, which I hopesubsides.
That said, the the when I think about these men and women that
are buried there, of course it'sa great tragedy when you have so

(39:55):
many 18/19/20 year olds whose lives didn't get to be lived.
But it's not just the tragedies of the families, it's a tragedy
for our country. How many creators and
inventions? Died and were never invented.
How many works of art that may have been world class that we

(40:16):
never saw painted? How many great writers were out
there who never got a chance to show us that they were a great
writer and story? How many great athletes?
How might history, our own history in the world history
have been influenced by what those 17,800 young spirits, not

(40:37):
that don't have any idea of whattheir potential is yet because
they had they, they offered so many of them volunteered to
suspend those that path, that life journey to go do something
that needed to be done. That was a noble endeavor.
So it's not just the families that lost something.
We as a country are diminished by not having had the dividends

(41:00):
of that talent and allow people to to get the fruits of that.
That's one thing. I think also, I'm 68 years old.
If there's anything I've learnedin life, you can't have too many
good friends. This country of ours, which we
all love so much, has had a friend in the Netherlands unlike
any other friend that we've had.Nothing's going to take away

(41:22):
from the majesty of the AmericanCemetery, of the of the Normandy
American Cemetery in Colleyville, Sir Mayor.
And then that and the importanceof what took place with the 9387
Americans that are buried there or the events of June 6th, 1944.
Nothing will ever detract from that.
This isn't a once better than the other, but there's something

(41:46):
special that takes place in the Netherlands with this cemetery
and the creation of the grave adoption program.
And it has a spirit and a life. And as I said, it's not just a
cemetery, it's a classroom. And when you think of classroom,
you think of young voices talking.
And so the fact that you could have, yes, there's a somber

(42:06):
element to it. You can't have all that many
gravestones and names on the walls and missing and not have
that. But it's much, much more than
that. And that is a spirit that
they've captured. That is something that we should
emulate as the American Legion. Let me say we, you know, OK, I'm
68, but even people, especially guys in their 30s and 40s,

(42:26):
everyone likes to talk about Band of Brothers, the movie, the
figurative expression, etcetera,etcetera.
You know what you want to know what that's really like, you
know, go to an American Legion event, go hang around some
veterans. Because you know what, if
you're, if you talk to them likenot BS talk, but I mean just
talk to them like another person, not glassy eyed or

(42:49):
something or glorifying what they're done.
Just talk to them as a human being.
Who are they? What were their dreams before
their service? What happened during their
service? Just be interested and also
listen, do a lot of listening. You're going to become a band of
brothers. You're going to have friends.
And like you say, these aren't passing friends.
I'll call you for lunch that youdon't call.

(43:11):
These are people that you will you'll connect with because
you're going to be really motivated to see them again and
you'll make some friendships that unless if you do any kind
of maintenance work, they'll be friends for life.
And you know what? And my experience of dealing
with people at the Legion and other veterans from a business
standpoint, I love, they're all about mission, the war, you

(43:34):
know, their service, military service is over, but their minds
trained Mission, mission, mission.
I got to accomplish my mission. You sit down, you talk, you
know, you're there to talk aboutsomething someone said, you know
what? I'm, you know, we're here.
We're here. It's great to see you.
We're here to accomplish this, this and this.
I just want to get that on the table before we start.
We need to come up with answers to these three things.
Now pass us all. Let's have a beer.

(43:55):
Fantastic. They're focused and they're
driven by that and they are going to follow through on that.
And so they're great people to work with and deal with because
they're focused still, as I said, they may not be wearing a
uniform, but that training is not going to leave them.
They're people that their words,their bond.
So, you know, yeah, I've got to deal with lawyers, got to have

(44:16):
paperwork, but you get one of those guys or gals to say this
is the deal, take it to the bank.
That's what they mean. And it's it's a fantastic
experience. So, you know, I know the lead
people get go to the Legion, they're veterans and all this
kind of stuff. But I tell you what, if you
don't get connected like that, you're missing out on one of
life's great experiences. And when I'm traveling, I travel

(44:38):
a lot and, and coming out of DFWI see a lot of guys either on
deployment, transferring, movingaround, etcetera, because of
American Eagle getting them around.
And I'm there with my two boys, seven years old and nine years
old, nine year old, just had a birthday the other day.
I'm an old dad and I'll say to him, you know, go over and say
hi. And they're a little
intimidated. And I used to be, too.

(45:00):
I didn't know how to talk to someone that's in service.
I did not know how to do it. And I realized, you know how you
talk to him, you go over and say, hi, my name is Robert
Edsel. What's your name?
Where are you going? Where are you from?
You know, what's going on with you, you with your buddies,
etcetera. And I learned how to talk to
him. And I take my boys over and they

(45:21):
stand there next to me and they watch me do this because that's
a legacy. I want them to realize there's
no mystification here. These aren't, you know, heroes
per SE. They've got a job to do.
They may do something that's heroic, but they're normal
people like you and me. Go talk to them like normal
people. Well, Robert, you and I are

(45:42):
officially friends. You can take that to the bank.
I want to thank you so much, Alphas.
Be sure to pick up your copy of Remember Us.
American Sacrifice. Dutch Freedom.
When's that going to drop? Is it out?
It's out. It came out in May.
It it made the New York Times bestseller list.
But you know, I, I, I know it sounds self.

(46:05):
It doesn't sound self effacing for me to tell people go read
this thing. You need to read it because I
have had some people say, yeah, well, you're an author.
You're trying to sell a book. I'm not trying to sell a book.
I'm trying to change the countryone person at a time.
And the way I know to do that best is read this and realize,
you know, we spend so much time talking about all the stuff
that's wrong. There's so much that's right.

(46:28):
Read this book and, and feel better as an American about the
remarkable people that have served, the remarkable people
that went to go find everyone that didn't make it back.
The people are still serving today, trying to identify people
that didn't make it back and thepeople in the Netherlands and
all that they're doing. And I, I hope people, even
whether they buy the book or not, go to foreverpromise.org.

(46:49):
And while we were while I was inTampa, I had two people from the
Legion write me and say, you know, I have a relative buried
there. I never knew about the grave
adoption program. And they said never heard of it.
And we always ask people, where'd you hear about it?
American Legion convention, that's so.
And I'm sure there's others out there because military families,

(47:10):
you know, usually it's more thanone generation of service.
So help us make that connection.As I said, we don't charge
anybody for it. And we will be put you in
contact with your Dutch adopter and it'll be a fantastic
experience. That's amazing.
Also, alphas, be sure to drop byRobert's website,
robertetzel.com, to check out his other works.

(47:31):
Get your copy of Remember Us. I'm gonna, I'm gonna.
For those who who may be visually impaired.
Do you have an Audible audio book of his?
There is, and the guy's a great reader.
His wife, by coincidence, happened to be Dutch.
Who can make this up? So he understood the history of
the country and the pronunciations.
It's really, really fun. Well, I'm gonna get my copy on
Audible and listen to that whileI do my horse chores.

(47:52):
Is that Robert, Be sure while you're at his website to follow
those social media handles. We'll have those in our show
notes along with the website. Thank you so much Robert.
It's been a pleasure to chat with you.
Thank you, Stacy. Thanks, Joe.
Really appreciate the questions.Thanks so much, and Alphas,
please stick around for some skuttle butt after the break.
Discover the power of your voiceand form a deeper understanding

(48:14):
of our nation and the principlesthat shape it.
As a participant in the AmericanLegion Oratorical contest,
you'll develop a deeper knowledge of the US Constitution
and a greater understanding of the duties, responsibilities,
rights, and privileges of American citizenship.
As you step up to this academic speaking challenge, you'll learn
leadership skills, the art of oration, and have a shot at

(48:37):
winning up to $25,000 in scholarships.
Seize your moment, visit legion.org/oratorical and take
the first steps towards shaping your future today.

(48:57):
OK Alphas, we hope you had a great break.
Now it's time for some scuttlebutt.
Scuttlebutt by by Jove, don't mind if I do.
Sorry, a little bit of whiplash here.
So this is from our friends. It's stars and stripes or
stripes and stars if you're dyslexic, no offense.

(49:18):
The Sesame Street characters aretying their aprons and lacing up
their sneakers to support military children and families
with a new digital program. Sesame Street for Military
Families and the Defense Department's Office of Military,
Family and Community Policy partnered to deliver free online
resources that make healthy meals and physical activity as
easy as ABC. Don't hold on, Defense

(49:42):
Department's Office of Military,Family and Community Policy.
Leave it to the military to comeup with the 5050 care.
Like, what the heck yeah name isthat?
And of course, it's going to be an acronym for ABC anyway.
Carry on. That's that's not going to fit
on a business card. That's that's my problem with
any title that doesn't fit on a business card without having to

(50:02):
flip it over, you've overdone it.
Truth. You've overdone it, so I'm sorry
if you're the assistant to the regional director for the
Defense Departments Office of Military, Family and Community
Policy, but your title is ridiculous.
I don't. There's not enough money in the
world for me to have that title anyway.

(50:26):
Healthy Happy Ready offers articles, videos and printable
activities and recipes to help military children and families
build habits around nutrition, exercise and emotional Wellness,
especially during times of transition and challenges that
come with military life. Because it doesn't just affect
the veterans. I think in, in a lot of ways, as

(50:46):
a veteran as, as us, we know it's going to be hard.
We know what to expect. So even when bad things
happened, it happened in a way that that makes sense.
There's a logical path. But sometimes when you're a kid
or even a, you know, a spouse, you don't feel like you have a
say in things a lot of the time.And sometimes it feels like

(51:09):
things are happening to you. You're not as much a part of it.
And I think it's so important to, to build up, you know, of
course, the sports system, like I mentioned earlier, but also to
have these good habits. So I think it's really great to
to focus on these these transitions and challenges that
come in military life. So Doctor Jeanette Belencourt

(51:32):
Bettencourt, senior vice president for the US Social
Impact at Sesame Workshop, said there's a lot of transitions
that little ones go through. Here's an opportunity to provide
what we believe is not only comfort, but routines.
We know that for young children,the idea of routines is really
important. It helps them feel safe,
comfortable and included Sesame Street characters such as Elmo,

(51:53):
who I I know wait. Can you do an Elmo voice?
Elmo that. Was perfect.
Do you remember Grover? I do remember Grover.
My SO, I have a three-year old, so we're real.
He carries around 2 Elmo's with him so that.
Seems redundant, but. Yeah, he's a redundant kind of

(52:14):
kid, so that works. Elmo, Rosita and Grover are
featured in three videos about preparing nutritious meals as a
family, growing a kitchen garden, and making physical
activity a regular part of the day.
The kid also includes healthy kid friendly recipes, articles
about meal planning and more. By the way, if you haven't
watched cookie Monsters, like meal prep stuff.

(52:35):
He makes healthy snacks. He's like Cookie Monster can't
always eat cookies sometimes. Cookie Monster Want healthy
snack? Oh, cookies.
It's, it's so they're really entertaining because they'll,
they'll, So what they'll do is they'll be like, they'll, he'll
start to make it and I forget what the other character is.
And they'll be like, Oh no, we need, we need fresh blueberries.

(52:56):
And so then they'll tie in like a small farmer somewhere out in
the middle of nowhere that does fresh blueberries.
And they'll have them package upsome blueberries and then cookie
Monster, cookie Monster jumps ina car and like drives all the
way there and gets them and thenbrings them back.
And so those are really fun. Oscar the Grouch was my was my

(53:17):
spirit animal. Yeah, Is he, that's is it
because of the smell? Well, him and Snuffy.
I'm right in the middle between Snuffy.
And Snuffleupagus, yes. Just.
Because, you know, yeah, there'sa, there's a version of Twinkle
Twinkle Little Star with Big Bird and Snuffleupagus and I
forget who it is. It's actually really good.
I kind of slap. Which may be a very unpopular

(53:39):
opinion, but I'm going to say itanyway.
Big Bird's voice bothered the heck out of me.
Maybe that's why I liked Snuffy so much, because he always had
that sort of deep baritone. Yeah.
Or maybe it was a she and she just identified as an elephant?
Or was he what? What was he A?
Mammoth. I think he's a woolly mammoth.
Yeah, I think Snuffalopagus is awoolly mammoth.

(54:00):
Anyway, kids and military families serve too, said Rosita,
A bilingual Muppet from Mexico. When their mommy or daddy goes
away to help people, kids help at home by being brave and
strong. We can help them by playing with
them, making yummy snacks and giving hugs that makes their
hearts feel happy. Betancourt said that the

(54:21):
characters aim to motivate children by selling a fun
example that they can follow andalso show parents ways to
introduce healthy habits into their existing routines.
Sesame Street for Military Families supports military
families, especially those with young children, by addressing
topics such as deployments, homecomings, relocations and
grief. And that's pretty great.

(54:45):
There's some really good Sesame Street songs, by the way.
There's a Andrea Bocelli singingto Elmo to go to sleep.
Like, yeah, that was good too. Holly's Holly's like control
Copying and pasting YouTube videos into the link.
Sorry, I'll stop talking about the the the great the Sesame
Street hits. That's wonderful.

(55:06):
Well, thank you, Sesame Street, for caring enough for our
military dependent children and making sure that they have a
place to feel seen and reference.
Well, I've got something for youin honor of today's guest.
You bet it. And I surely, I surely did.
I went down that Reddit rabbit hole to see what I could find on

(55:29):
the cemetery in the Netherlands.I found a compelling thread
which led with a quote. There's a cemetery in the
Netherlands consisting of 8300 US veterans who died in World
War 2. Which is interesting because
Robert said that there was more like 17,000, but I don't know
which is. Perhaps this Reddit poster
didn't check their facts anyway.Anyway.

(55:51):
What are you trying to say aboutredditors?
That they're just normal people who sometimes just say things.
Well, I am part of that bunch. Me too.
Anyway, they go on to say for the last 70 years, Dutch
families have come to the cemetery every Sunday to care
for the grave they've adopted. Hundreds of people are currently
on a waiting list to become caretakers.
So not only are there enough people in the Netherlands to

(56:14):
care for these grades every Sunday, but there's a wait list
to have that honor. So here are some incredible
responses to that post that I found.
And again, I'm going to preface this alphas that I don't come up
with the handles these Reddit users use.
So when I say something that seems crass or colorful, it's

(56:35):
their fault, not mine. I'm just repeating what they
have. OK at Misses Mommypants shared
my grandfather has a memorial there.
He was missing in action and hisbody was never recovered.
I had no idea that the Dutch were even doing this.
It made me tear up. Many thanks to the Dutch
families doing this at Porta Potty Johnny.

(56:55):
Nothing serious could ever come out from a name like that.
But anyway they went on to say my grandfather is also buried
there. He was AB17 crew member, a
copilot or a navigator not quitesure.
He was shot down over Holland. My grandma took my mom over
there and she was a teenager to visit the grave and the

(57:15):
surrounding area. I heard of the incredible
hospitality of the grateful Dutch.
They took my mom and my grandma as if they were family.
And mom was so taken by this that she later named my little
sister after one of the girls she roomed with.
To which Bales Bailey responded,a very moving story.
My sympathies to the loss of your grandfather in this way and

(57:38):
my deepest gratitude to your grandmother for helping liberate
my country. That that's right, they said my
country. I'm free because their courage
and sacrifice at Julianus noted.Please know that if the walls
with the names of the missing have a very poignant location at
the entrance of the cemetery, ifhe were ever to be found, a

(58:01):
small poppy would be added to the names to signal his no
longer missing. I grew up near the site.
Oh wow. That's an interesting point.
So yeah, I guess as they identify those who were missing
in action, they put a poppy to symbolize that they've been
found, which is great at toxic, toxic, Teco said.

(58:21):
My uncle's buried there. We're in contact with the family
who cares for his grave. We're very appreciative for the
work that they do at the Driven Rain posted.
My grandfather's brother is buried there.
He was 18 when he died in the battle.
A young family adopted his graveand years ago they contacted our
local newspaper based off the town on his gravestone and got

(58:43):
in contact with my father and aunt.
They have been and have become like family to us.
We have visited them in the Netherlands and they have
traveled to the US to visit our family.
It really touches me that this family cares so much and has
created new bonds with my family.
In my opinion, this is the ultimate way to remember and

(59:03):
honor someone. Wow at sure Cat shared.
Yes, that's yes, I, I said it. Was an exclamation.
Point in her. Yes.
Yes, my grandfather fought in the Battle of the Schlett Sapper
in the back in the Black Watch. He made it back home but was all
all moved to tears at the respect if not it's next level

(59:24):
to anything he saw back home that the Netherlands has always
shown towards the Canadians who made it back, but more
importantly to those who made the ultimate sacrifice.
And so as you guys can tell thisthese are this is feedback from
not only Americans who are interred.
There are families of Americans,but Canadians.
The British at Bailey Bailey's also remarked.

(59:47):
I am a millennial and still feelthe gratitude to the fallen.
They made the ultimate sacrificeand we owe our freedom to them.
I don't know if it's the same for everyone, for example,
because I have known all of my grandparents as they survived
the war and could tell me their stories.
But I believe families do try toteach their children that

(01:00:08):
freedom is never to be taken forgranted because there are
actually people who laid down their lives for us.
Makes me emotional even now. And if you haven't figured it
out, Bailey's. Bailey's is Dutch.
She lives in the Netherlands at Copper Wasp added a wonderful
Dutch family lady looked after my great uncle's grave for 75

(01:00:31):
years. She was 18 when she volunteered
and until very recently went every weekend to his grave.
Now her family looks after that grave.
One somber post read. Years ago I went to Tyne Cot
Cemetery and was humbled by the thousands of neat graves.
Then you realize that there are there are just the dead that

(01:00:54):
were recovered with the 10s of thousands recorded at the Menane
gate, who simply disappeared without a trace into the mud of
the a pair. Then you visit the German
graveyard where instead of the individual crosses, 10s of
thousands of dead were simply dumped into a huge mass grave
with a single stone each. A life.

(01:01:17):
Such a terrible waste. And in that note, this would not
be a true Reddit rabbit hole if I didn't share some light
hearted remarks from Alpha. So here we go.
At Iron Apples noted near my town in the Netherlands there is
a World War 2 cemetery where a guy named Harry Potter is
buried. No joke.
He was 18 or 19 as I recall. To which Joaqui responded.

(01:01:42):
Not surprising. The reason the name was chosen
is it's such a boring, generic, old fashioned sort of name.
Well, sorry, Harry Potter. Lots of claims for the real
Harry Potter out there at Abstract, Betafish remarked.
Same reason Ian Fleming chose the name James Bond.
He wanted a generic English namethat he could pick.

(01:02:03):
Ironically, he was inspired by his American neighbor in the
Caribbean. One of the world's most famous
fictional Englishman was named after some dude from
Philadelphia. OK, but did you know that his
first name was Bond? James Bond.
Well, at Abstract Beta Fish responded with, and this is the

(01:02:25):
final one. There's a Jack Dawson's grave at
the cemetery. They buried bodies recovered
from the Titanic in Newfoundland.
Yes, Jack Dawson, there was roomon that plank.
I tell you there was room anyway, He's he's a.
Conspiracy theorist. When the movie came out, his
grave got all kinds of attention, but the real Jack

(01:02:46):
Dawson was a crewman. Nothing like the Leo character
that that had his name. So there you have it.
There you have it. Alfa's.
Hey, thanks for listening. You can subscribe to our podcast
or newsletter or send us mail and guest recommendations at
legion.org. back slash Tal. We'll see you next time.