Powerful True Story from World War II

There are many people in life who struggle with their circumstances, pondering repeatedly how hard their life seems to be in so many ways. I have a good friend, Jim Ritchie, who passes along his wisdom on a regular basis. I am fortunate to be in his e-mail distribution list. Here's a recent e-mail he sent out that I felt was inspirational, especially for folks like me who make up what later became known as the "baby boom generation" who missed the events of World War II - events that would change the lives not only of my parents, but also the lives of everyone on planet Earth. We sometimes forget it was young men who fought to preserve freedom, as this story clearly depicts. May we never forget the true heroes who died and never came home. I hope you enjoy:

True story.....

Each year I am hired to go to Washington, DC, with the eighth grade class from Clinton, WI, where I grew up, to videotape their trip. I greatly enjoy visiting our nation’s capital, and each year I take some special memories back with me. This fall's trip was especially memorable.  

Iwo Jima Memorial,
Arlington Cemetery, Washington D.C.

On the last night of our trip, we stopped at the Iwo Jima memorial. This memorial is the largest bronze statue in the world and depicts one of the most famous photographs in history -- that of the six brave soldiers raising the American flag at the top of a rocky hill on the island of Iwo Jima, Japan, during WW II.  

Over one hundred students and chaperones piled off the buses and headed towards the memorial. I noticed a solitary figure at the base of the statue, and as I got closer he asked, "Where are you guys from?"

I told him we were from Wisconsin. "Hey, I'm a cheese head, too! Come gather around, cheese heads, and I will tell you a story."

It was James Bradley who just happened to be in Washington, DC, to speak at the memorial the following day. He was there that night to say goodnight to his Dad, who had passed away. He was just about to leave when he saw the buses pull up. I videotaped him as he spoke to us, and received his permission to share what he said from my videotape. It is one thing to tour the incredible monuments filled with history in Washington, DC, but it is quite another to get the kind of insight we received that night.

When all had gathered around, he reverently began to speak. Here are his words that night:

"My name is James Bradley and I'm from Antigo, Wisconsin. My Dad is on that statue, and I wrote a book called Flags of Our Fathers. It is the story of the six boys you see behind me.  

Iwo Jima Memorial

"Six boys raised the flag. The first guy putting the pole in the ground is Harlon Block. Harlon was an all-state football player. He enlisted in the Marine Corps with all the senior members of his football team. They were off to play another type of game. A game called 'War.' But it didn't turn out to be a game. Harlon, at the age of 21, died with his intestines in his hands. I don't say that to gross you out, I say that because there are people who stand in front of this statue and talk about the glory of war. You guys need to know that most of the boys in Iwo Jima were 17, 18, and 19 years old - and it was so hard that the ones who did make it home never even would talk to their families about it.

(He pointed to the statue) "You see this next guy? That's Rene Gagnon from New Hampshire. If you took Rene's helmet off at the moment this photo was taken and looked in the webbing of that helmet, you would find a photograph, a photograph of his girlfriend. Rene put that in there for protection because he was scared. He was 18 years old. It was just boys who won the battle of Iwo Jima. Boys. Not old men.  

"The next guy here, the third guy in this tableau, was Sergeant Mike Strank. Mike is my hero. He was the hero of all these guys. They called him the 'old man' because he was so old. He was already 24. When Mike would motivate his boys in training camp, he didn't say, 'Let's go kill some Japanese' or 'Let's die for our country.' He knew he was talking to little boys. Instead he would say, 'You do what I say, and I'll get you home to your mothers.'

"The last guy on this side of the statue is Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian from Arizona. Ira Hayes was one of them who lived to walk off Iwo Jima. He went into the White House with my Dad. President Truman told him, 'You're a hero.' He told reporters, 'How can I feel like a hero when 250 of my buddies hit the island with me and only 27 of us walked off alive?'

"So you take your class at school, 250 of you spending a year together having fun, doing everything together. Then all 250 of you hit the beach, but only 27 of your classmates walk off alive. That was Ira Hayes. He had images of horror in his mind. Ira Hayes carried the pain home with him and eventually died dead drunk, face down, drowned in a very shallow puddle at the age of 32 (ten years after this picture was taken).  

"The next guy, going around the statue, is Franklin Sousley from Hilltop, Kentucky, a fun-lovin' hillbilly boy. His best friend, who is now 90, told me, 'Yeah, you know, we took two cows up on the porch of the Hilltop General Store. Then we strung wire across the stairs so the cows couldn't get down. Then we fed them Epsom salts. Those cows crapped all night.' Yes, he was a fun-lovin' hillbilly boy. Franklin died on Iwo Jima at the age of 19. When the telegram came to tell his mother that he was dead, it went to the Hilltop General Store. A barefoot boy ran that telegram up to his mother's farm. The neighbors could hear her scream all night and into the morning. Those neighbors lived a quarter of a mile away.

'The next guy, as we continue to go around the statue, is my Dad, John Bradley, from Antigo, Wisconsin, where I was raised. My Dad lived until 1994, but he would never give interviews.

"When Walter Cronkite's producers or the New York Times would call, we were trained as little kids to say 'No, I'm sorry, sir, my Dad's not here. He is in Canada fishing. No, there is no phone there, sir. No, we don't know when he is coming back.' My Dad never fished or even went to Canada. Usually, he was sitting there right at the table eating his Campbell 's soup. But we had to tell the press that he was out fishing. He didn't want to talk to the press.  

"You see, like Ira Hayes, my Dad didn't see himself as a hero. Everyone thinks these guys are heroes, 'cause they are in a photo and on a monument. My Dad knew better. He was a medic. John Bradley from Wisconsin was a combat caregiver. On Iwo Jima he probably held over 200 boys as they died. And when boys died on Iwo Jima, they writhed and screamed, without any medication or help with the pain.  

"When I was a little boy, my third-grade teacher told me that my Dad was a hero. When I went home and told my Dad that, he looked at me and said, 'I want you always to remember that the heroes of Iwo Jima are the guys who did not come back. Did NOT come back.'  

"So that's the story about six nice young boys. Three died on Iwo Jima, and three came back as national heroes. Overall, 7,000 boys died on Iwo Jima in the worst battle in the history of the Marine Corps. My voice is giving out, so I will end here. Thank you for your time."

Suddenly, the monument wasn't just a big old piece of metal with a flag sticking out of the top. It came to life before our eyes with the heartfelt words of a son who did, indeed, have a father who was a hero. Maybe not a hero for the reasons most people would believe, but a hero nonetheless.  

One thing I learned while on tour with my eighth-grade students in DC that is not mentioned here is that if you look at the statue very closely and count the number of hands raising the flag, there are 13. When the man who made the statue was asked why there were 13, he simply said the 13th hand was the hand of God.  

"I Am So Grateful. . ."

We have returned home from our trip to Washington D.C. where we picked up Sister Merilee Goates. She was released into our care and keeping a week ago on Thursday morning at the final transfer meeting. I take today's title for this post from Sister Goates.

If there were one phrase I heard repeatedly more than any other from our daughter, it was this one - "I am so grateful for. . ." and then she would cite a specific blessing she had received. The list included her testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ as she witnessed the dramatic changes that had come into people's lives whom she had taught.

She referred again and again to members of the Church with whom she had labored to teach their friends, many of whom eventually joined the Church.

I heard her express gratitude for ALL the people who had changed her life for the better, including her mission president, Matthew Riggs, and his wife and their children, the senior missionary couples who had influenced her, her companions, and all the leaders of the Church she had met, including President Brian Swinton of the Washington D.C. Temple. We had a chance to renew our boyhood ties as we concluded an endowment session last Saturday morning. She mentioned several occasions where he had given sound counsel to missionaries and members.

There was a stranger she met on the Metro as we rode back from the city that day, an engaging black lady who was a grandmother and lifelong government employee who was full of light. After their brief encounter, Sister Goates expressed gratitude for putting that wonderful woman in her path that day so she could invite her to join our Church. She was a Southern Baptist, who knew much about the Mormons and had visited the Washington D.C. Temple in times past.

Gratitude was on her lips for a pair of shoes someone had sent to her on her mission, and for a sweater an investigator had given her when she needed warmth during her first bitter cold winter in Virginia. I also heard gratitude expressed for Honeycrisp apples to which she was introduced. She was never without one thereafter, so grateful for the discovery.

The weather was also on the list. We were at Mount Vernon on a November day basking in 70 degrees when she said it. She also spoke of green trees, so dense that in summer it was impossible to navigate because of the canopy of leaves on all those trees. And then her gratitude was for the fall colors of the leaves that were still clinging to their branches. And then it was for barren trees that made it possible to discern our surroundings more clearly.

Her citizenship in the United States also made the list of things for which she is most grateful. Living in that history-rich environment had heightened her awareness of all our blessings as free people, and the incredible price for freedom that has been paid by so many hundreds of thousands for that precious gift. It is hard to visit those stirring memorials on the National Mall and not be moved. The inspired quotations chiseled in granite, marble and other stones remind everyone of the cost to overthrow tyranny. The World War II Memorial honors over 400,000 lost in the global conflict. The price of freedom is always eternal vigilance. May we never forget the sacrifices of so many! The Vietnam War Memorial inscribed with all the names of the dead in that conflict designed to stop the march of communism was yet another reminder.

On a gorgeous fall morning in November, she shed some tears as we stood inside the Lincoln Memorial and I recounted my love for that iconic American leader who presided during a very divisive time in our history. Emotions were also close to the surface as we stood at the base of the statue of Thomas Jefferson at the other end of the Tidal Basin. Reading their words in those sacred precincts is inspiring. Later we watched the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and soberly pondered how many there must be like that one in our perpetual struggle to remain free. As we visited JFK's grave site overlooking the capital city and stood before the eternal flame burning there, hope of our perpetual freedom in America was rekindled and sunk deep within our hearts. We were there only hours before the commemoration of Kennedy's death fifty years ago. Oh, what memories it conjured up within me!

Iwo Jima Memorial

She admitted her favorite monument was the Iwo Jima statue, since it was not far from her apartment in Arlington and she was able to visit frequently during her stay there. She was so grateful for those sacred times of somber reflection.

Perhaps most impressive was her introduction to us of a young refugee from Egypt, Yousef, a Coptic Christian who was forced to flee to America when the violence against Christians in Egypt seemed to accelerate a couple of years ago. Yousef is on date for baptism into the Church in December. We had a chance to read several scriptures with him, to testify, and to re-commit him to his baptism date. That's really what we spent most of our time doing in D.C. - retracing her steps with people she had met, loved, served and taught.

As we spoke with Yousef he told us how excited he was about the prospects that soon all minority groups, including the Mormons, would be recognized in two months when the new Constitution for Egypt becomes ratified. His desktop background has pictures of Mormon temples that dot the globe now. He loves the thought that someday there will be temple in Cairo. I told him I felt impressed he would be in the vanguard of early pioneer saints in Egypt, all in fulfillment of the prophecy of Elder Bruce R. McConkie in 1980. Yousef, thrilled at the prospect when I explained he would someday be a pioneer for Mormonism in his beloved Egypt, exulted, "Soon everyone on earth will know about the Mormons!" I felt impressed to tell him I believed as part of Elder McConkie's prophecy there would someday be a temple in Cairo, and he would live to see the day come to pass if he remained faithful to his testimony.

As we left his apartment with water bottles he had graciously given to us out of the little he had to give, Sister Goates once again said, "Meeting Yousef has helped me to appreciate so much my citizenship in America. I had always taken so much for granted. He is here to escape death in his own country, where he told me Christians were being slaughtered in the streets. How grateful I am for freedom to worship God!"

Tears silently fell as the aerial view of Washington D.C. faded into the distance on the horizon. Her face now turned West to resume her life again. She will look back with fondness on her missionary experience, but she will also begin a new chapter now with a renewed sense of gratitude, cultivated from her last eighteen months in Virginia. She will never again be the same person she was.

So we are grateful this week before Thanksgiving for all our blessings as a family. As we recount them all, our list like Merilee's grows longer and longer. This year they include being reunited with Merilee, and yesterday we met our first grandson at the airport, Elder Izach Jach, who returned home from the Iowa Des Moines Mission, taller, broader, and a pillar of power after a mission experience filled with happiness and success.

Our cup is running over, and I am so grateful. . .

Leaving the Beautiful Virginia

As many close to our family will know, our youngest (and last of eight full-time missionaries) is wrapping up her mission in the Washington D. C. South Mission this week. We depart on Wednesday to meet her back there and bring her home next week after spending some time meeting the people with whom she has labored. Her final testimony is worth sharing with everyone:

Sister Woodbury (l), Sister Goates (r)

Oh my goodness! I can't believe today is here.  My last Preparation Day as a missionary. What an incredible 18 months it has been! It truly has been the best of my life. I have been refined and molded. I am so grateful for the experiences and the miracles the Lord has blessed me to witness for the past year and a half.

I know God truly is our loving Heavenly Father and He truly does know each of us personally and perfectly. I know He ALWAYS has our best interest in mind. He wants us to be happy. We are His children and He has sent us here to be happy and find joy, but also to have trials and to be tested so we can become more like Him and learn more about His attributes so we can gain them as well.

I am so grateful for the perspective a mission has given me for my life. I have learned so much. I am grateful for the weaknesses the Lord has revealed to me so I can work on them and He can refine me and help me become stronger.

This past week has been bitter-sweet. Mostly, it still hasn't hit me that I'm really leaving and that this is the end of my mission. Nonetheless, it has still been a very special week. I was able to go to the temple with the other departing missionaries, and what a sacred experience that was. I am so grateful for the temple and I'm grateful for the knowledge of the significance of the temple in my life and the blessings that come as we keep the covenants we make there and as we become a "Temple Going and Covenant Keeping" people. I know the temple truly is the House of the Lord. I know it is there our families truly are sealed together for time and all eternity. There is NOTHING greater in this life than that knowledge right there. There is NOTHING that brings greater joy or peace in this life, than the knowledge of the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. There really isn't.

It is because of the events Joseph Smith had in his life that we have the gospel today. How grateful I am for his sacrifice and for his humility in offering that sincere and humble prayer that day in the Sacred Grove. I know without a shadow of a doubt that he truly did have that experience. I know through that experience we truly do have the fulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. With that knowledge, we have been promised never again will we be in darkness and never again will we not have a prophet on the Earth. What an incredible promise!

I know President Thomas S. Monson is our living prophet today. I know it is through him we have all of the Preisthood Keys so we can partake in ALL the ordinances needed to return to live with our Heavenly Father and with our families again.

We had an INCREDIBLY powerful stake conference this past weekend. We had Elder David F. Evans of the Seventy come and it truly was a spiritual feast! Also, apparently he knows the Goates family well. [Editor's note: His mother and mine served in the Federal Heights Ward Relief Society Presidency, then later as members of the Relief Society General Board under Sister Barbara Smith.] He is part of the Missionary Department and it was a powerful weekend here in the Oakton Stake. We were told we have some of the finest leaders in the Church in this stake and it was encouraging to hear we have such great potential in performing so many incredible miracles with a combined effort. It was inspiring and I felt the Spirit so strongly.

It made my heart hurt a little when I realized with all this fire the members have now that I won't be able to help keep that fire ignited and continue to encourage them much longer as a missionary, but I know I still can as a member missionary.

I received very specific and wonderful revelation for what I can do to continue to be a missionary. It was wonderful. It was humbling to be called before the stake to share my testimony my last Sunday as a missionary. It was an incredible opportunity and I was so grateful for it.

I know this work is real. I also know it is truly hastening. I have felt that for a long time, but the urgency was so apparent this weekend as we listened to Elder Evans and President Monson, a prophet, seer, and revelator, talk about it in our conference. It is happening, the signs of the times are here and we don't have much time. Now is the time to prepare. Now is the time to be more engaged than ever. It is my prayer each of us will be, and continue in our missionary efforts until our Lord and Savior returns.

I love you all. I thank you for your constant love and support for me. I can't express and thank you enough for the help to get me on a mission, whether it has been contributing money, your time, or the experiences we've had together. Each of you has been a support to me and has helped bless my life so much in helping me be in a position where I could have this incredible experience. I am so grateful to my loving Heavenly Father for the invaluable experiences He has given me and lessons He has been able to teach me during this sacred time in my life. Thank you for all you've done to help in any part or form in that.

I love you all. I love my Savior and I love His work.

All my love and gratitude,

Sister Merilee Goates

My Ambassador to Washington D.C.

U.S. Capitol Building, Washington, D.C.

The first week in May our youngest daughter, Merilee will embark on her LDS mission to the Washington D.C. South Mission. There is a sweet irony in her call to serve for this father who regularly writes about politics and religion. She will likely want to discuss politics before she leaves, but what she doesn't realize is that she will have no need of it for the next eighteen months.

Instead, Merilee's mission will focus on the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. All she needs is laid out for her, and for that matter, all the world to see and understand in the four works of scripture published by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: The Holy Bible, The Book of Mormon, The Doctrine and Covenants, and The Pearl of Great Price. She will have the glorious privilege and matchless opportunity to ignore politics, even while she is living serving others voluntarily in the "belly of the beast."

When she was born, her mother and I had no trouble selecting her name. We had a dear friend, Merilee Tanner Preece, whom we had long admired and treasured for her kind spirit, her enthusiasm, and her gentility. Our Merilee was, as they say, "well-named." She has been a constant source of joy and happiness for us as her parents. She has had many and varied experiences since her graduation from South Summit High School in our little mountain community hamlet. She's been to SUU and USU as a student, and most recently she has been living in Sunnyvale, California, with an older sister and her family while she has been working to save for her mission. She is well prepared to take this next step. My father's heart is still wrenching a bit as I think about sending her out. It never seems to get easier, especially when it's a daughter who is leaving for the mission field. Sons, no problem. But daughters? It's just harder when you're their Dad and you remember them as that helpless little infant you once held in your arms.

So what advice do I have for her? It is simple, and can be summarized in the three words my father wrote in the front of my journal: "Service to Others." Not particularly original, and probably plagiarized from many independent sources, but nevertheless still serviceable as a motto to live by. Merilee has always served well. She was a SBO in high school, she was a camp counselor at Oakcrest, she has served others in many capacities since then, but one thing has always been consistent about her - she blooms where she's planted.

Sister Merilee Goates

As she leaves to serve her mission in Washington D.C., she will be thrust into the community where politics is a way of life every day for people with whom she will rub shoulders. Even if she weren't going to Washington D.C. she would find contention, anxiety about the future, and competing ideas for what is right and wrong.

The Book of Mormon offers precious insight:

But behold, there shall be many — at that day when I shall proceed to do a marvelous work among them, that I may remember my covenants which I have made unto the children of men, that I may set my hand again the second time to recover my people, which are of the house of Israel;

And also, that I may remember the promises which I have made unto thee, Nephi, and also unto thy father, that I would remember your seed; and that the words of your seed should proceed forth out of my mouth unto your seed; and my words shall hiss forth unto the ends of the earth, for a standard unto my people, which are of the house of Israel;

And because my words shall hiss forth — many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible.

But thus saith the Lord God: O fools, they shall have a Bible; and it shall proceed forth from the Jews, mine ancient covenant people. And what thank they the Jews for the Bible which they receive from them? Yea, what do the Gentiles mean? Do they remember the travails, and the labors, and the pains of the Jews, and their diligence unto me, in bringing forth salvation unto the Gentiles?

O ye Gentiles, have ye remembered the Jews, mine ancient covenant people? Nay; but ye have cursed them, and have hated them, and have not sought to recover them. But behold, I will return all these things upon your own heads; for I the Lord have not forgotten my people.

Thou fool, that shall say: A Bible, we have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible. Have ye obtained a Bible save it were by the Jews?

Know ye not that there are more nations than one? Know ye not that I, the Lord your God, have created all men, and that I remember those who are upon the isles of the sea; and that I rule in the heavens above and in the earth beneath; and I bring forth my word unto the children of men, yea, even upon all the nations of the earth?

Wherefore murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word? Know ye not that the testimony of two nations is a witness unto you that I am God, that I remember one nation like unto another? Wherefore, I speak the same words unto one nation like unto another. And when the two nations shall run together the testimony of the two nations shall run together also.

And I do this that I may prove unto many that I am the same yesterday, today, and forever; and that I speak forth my words according to mine own pleasure. And because that I have spoken one word ye need not suppose that I cannot speak another; for my work is not yet finished; neither shall it be until the end of man, neither from that time henceforth and forever.

Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written.

For I command all men, both in the east and in the west, and in the north, and in the south, and in the islands of the sea, that they shall write the words which I speak unto them; for out of the books which shall be written I will judge the world, every man according to their works, according to that which is written.

For behold, I shall speak unto the Jews and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto the Nephites and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto the other tribes of the house of Israel, which I have led away, and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto all nations of the earth and they shall write it.

And it shall come to pass that the Jews shall have the words of the Nephites, and the Nephites shall have the words of the Jews; and the Nephites and the Jews shall have the words of the lost tribes of Israel; and the lost tribes of Israel shall have the words of the Nephites and the Jews.

And it shall come to pass that my people, which are of the house of Israel, shall be gathered home unto the lands of their possessions; and my word also shall be gathered in one. And I will show unto them that fight against my word and against my people, who are of the house of Israel, that I am God, and that I covenanted with Abraham that I would remember his seed forever. (2 Nephi 29, emphasis mine).

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

The Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, will be in Washington D.C. this weekend, meeting with President Obama and speaking at AIPAC tomorrow. Never before has Israel's physical existence been more threatened than it is right now with the prospects of a rogue leadership in Iran proclaiming their intentions to wipe Israel off the map. Iran is developing nuclear weaponry designed to do just that. Wars and rumors of wars, indeed! Our political interests as Americans are closely aligned with Israel's, but more importantly we are brothers in the family of Abraham, and we are brothers with all the descendants of Ishmael, including all who are of Islam, too. We are children of the same God.

Merilee will be taking the message of the restoration of the gospel in its fulness to the inhabitants of Washington D.C. at a critical time when that message has never been more timely. It is a message of peace and a promise of fulfillment, as we see in the quote cited above. It is a time of gathering, and nowhere in the United States is there a more representative melting pot for the nations than Washington D.C. and its environs.

We send her out with full confidence she will have an impact. Her message and her demeanor will change many lives for good. She is a gatherer, and she will gather many.

God promised he would not forget His promises made to father Abraham, and his descendants all these generations later who now reside in Washington D.C., whether they be Jew, Gentile, Muslim or Christian will be blessed collectively and individually by her service.

"I covenanted with Abraham that I would remember his seed forever." And he's sending Sister Merilee Goates to deliver on that promise.