Taps, 1958
A reflection on Memorial Day 1958 and what it means for today.
Photo by Isabella Fischer on Unsplash
I originally published this post a couple of months ago. My memory of Memorial Day, 1958, still expresses my feelings on this Memorial Day. So here it is again, especially for all new subscribers.
Occasionally, I publish anecdotes from my life experience. If you like that sort of thing, please let me know in a comment. Comments are open to all.
_______________________________
On a sunny, somewhat cool Memorial Day morning in 1958, I was marching with my high school band toward the cemetery next to the home where I grew up. We stepped along at 120 beats per minute, playing John Philip Sousa’s The Washington Post march.
I felt proud of the band and the day. For the first time, I was big enough to fit into my blue and black uniform. Following the American Legion color guard, complete with U.S. and State of Indiana flags and flanked by rifle-carrying veterans, we could glimpse the crowd awaiting our arrival.
Our small community was close-knit. We all knew one another and one another’s families very well (sometimes a little too well to suit teenagers’ desire for privacy!). And that day, we were to honor the memory of six men who had been killed in combat during World War II a mere decade and a half earlier.
World War II touched our community hard. The families – spouses and children – of the six still lived among us. We knew them and their pain. And they were accompanied by other veterans of the war, including my scoutmaster who had served as an Army Ranger.
When we got to the cemetery, we marched to our designated place and stood at attention. After a brief introduction by the American Legion commander, we played the National Anthem. I remember the breeze snapping the flags out straight in the silence that followed.
Then, members of the Legion stepped forward and offered brief eulogies for each of the dead veterans. Following each speech, a family member planted a small American flag next to a white cross.
Quickly, the Legion commander called the guard to attention: “Present arms! Aim! Fire!” The three volleys ripped the silence. Feeling that in my gut, I was stunned.
After guns’ echoes died away, my best friend stepped forward from the band and played “Taps” on his trumpet. No mistakes!
We then turned and marched out of the cemetery to the muffled beat of a drum.
I had just participated in what I was later to learn is the most solemn ritual of the American Civil Religion (ACR) on one of its most sacred days.
Anti-Communism and My Version of Americanism
When I graduated from high school, I was firmly in the camp of those who held that Americans are fundamentally different from “godless communists.” After all, we print “In God We Trust” on our money and public buildings. We include the words, “under God,” in our Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. Our Republic’s founders believed (or many did) that human rights are conferred by God. We celebrate Thanksgiving as a holiday of gratitude (to God?) for the blessings that we enjoy.
Compared to communists whom we regarded as “crass materialists” who believed only in physical reality, we held fast to and even died for positive moral ideals.
Of course, I never thought then about an “American Civil Religion,” but I knew about the ideals, texts, political system, and collective expressions that held us all together in one society.
It never occurred to me to fundamentally question this system of belief and practice, this worldview. Over against it, I regarded the Soviet Union and all societies inspired by Marxist thought as enemies. End of story.
Except it wasn’t the end.
Awakening to Public Criticism
Quite simply, when I graduated from high school, I was a racist but didn’t know it. My small town was a “sundown town,” meaning that all persons of color had to leave town by sundown according to town ordinance. Of course, Black people were smart enough to avoid the town altogether.
Nevertheless, when I went to college a few miles away, I encountered a Black roommate who proceeded to educate me. During the fall term of my second year, Frank Starkey told me about his experience growing up in Indianapolis. Although I knew that the Civil War had ended slavery, Frank’s story and his inviting me to his home for Thanksgiving transformed my outlook. A year later, he and I joined others in founding the first racially integrated fraternity on our campus.
That’s when I realized that my country – its culture, laws, and customs – was wrong. The approach of Martin Luther King, Jr., who used the founding documents of the American Republic to critique lack of implementation of the country’s ideals, taught me that I could criticize my country without being disloyal. Indeed, patriotism demanded nothing less.
Thus, I began to publicly protest, engage in efforts to desegregate public venues, and work to change local laws. That effort continued throughout my career and later came to include protesting U.S. policy in Vietnam.
Still, since college classmates were fighting and dying in that misbegotten war, I never criticized the troops. Accordingly, fellow protesters against the Vietnam War sometimes ostracized me for not being militant enough.
What Did American Troops Die for in World War II?
I know what many soldiers in that war were fighting for because some of them told me. They were fighting to stop totalitarian aggression and the slaughter of millions of innocent people. They feared not doing so would endanger fellow Americans, their families, and friends. It really was that simple.
Some servicemen – including my two uncles, one in the Navy (Democrat) and the other in the Army Air Corps (Republican) – carried their reasoning a step further. Both told me that they were fighting for the freedom to disagree. This freedom to hear out and criticize the opinions of others, including government officials (as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution), was explicitly denied by the totalitarian regimes in Germany, Italy, Japan, and Russia (despite the latter’s official alliance with Western allies at the time).
As the current occupant of the White House surrounds himself with loyalist sycophants, I cannot help concluding that his regime now betrays everything that those who fought in World War II were willing to die for.
Lemonade
As our band followed the color guard out of the cemetery and down the hill to my home, I was surprised that my mother had set out some pitchers of lemonade for those who had participated. The day had become rather hot, and everyone was glad for the cool refreshment before hiking a mile back to the high school.
That Memorial Day in 1958 was a happy, sad, and inspiring event for me. Today, as I reflect nostalgically on it, it seems naïve. I was unprepared for the upheavals to come, for me and the country. And I often wonder today what my mother and her generation would think of the calamity through which we now live.
Is it time for someone to play “Taps” for the U.S.?