National D Day Memorial

Material from a previous blog:

Today was Fabulous FUN Family Friday by F9!  (If you don’t know what that is see my post on FFFF in Homeschool with us.)  F9′s topic was D-Day.  He has been studying this independently for months now.  He read D-Day by Stephen Ambrose (in a race with his Daddy) & is now reading several other shorter books on the topic. 

For his FFFF we decided to travel to Bedford Virginia to visit the National D-Day Memorial which we learned about from Ambrose’s book.  This was a really amazing memorial & well worth the trip.  It is a memorial so respectful behavior is expected & it is not very interactive but it is spread out enough & massive enough to keep even young ones interested for a few hours.  We were only doing a day trip but if you had more time there were lots of other surrounding attractions including the Booker T. Washington Memorial.

This photo shows part of the memorial garden.  Did you know the foresight & daring investment of an independent businessman was responsible for the US aluminum industry being prepared for WWII?

There was soo much to see & learn about from this memorial & having studied beforehand made the experience even richer.  I was very impressed with how everything about the memorial had some type of meaning & significance right down to which way the monuments were facing!  There were statues, artifacts, & plaques representing every aspect of the D-Day invasion.  Upon entering you are provided with a detailed map which creates your own tour if you follow along with it.  There are also guided tours (on foot or golf cart) for an additional fee.  We decided not to do the guided tour because F9 could be a D-Day tour guide himself.  I did manage however to find one fact to stump him- he did not know who the WAVES & WRENS were!  But they had a plaques describing their contribution to D-day so he went on a search & knew before we left.

Three of our boys in front of a WWII type propeller plane.  This type of plane was used for survielance & to locate bombing targets & troop locations.  It held 2 men (one piloted & the other had a cork board with a map across his lap to relay locations.)  The plane’s wings were made of canvas so bullets could pass right trhough & the plane keep going!

This was an especially touching trip for all of us because both of our grandfathers served in WWII & we are always amazed at what it cost them-"comfort, safety, innocence, youth, blood-even life itself."  As one of the plaques stated so well, "That you yourself are free and here today is but a portion of their rich and enduring legacy.  Treasure it."

I strongly encourage anyone who can to visit this monument.  Unfortunately with the current economic state of our country their donations have dropped by 50% & they are facing possible closure due to budget restraints.  Children ages 5 & under are free, ages 6-16 are $3 & adults are $5.  You can get more info about the memorial or check on their budget status at www.dday.org

This part of the memorial was my boys favorite.  It includes a scene with 4 bronze sculpture series to represent one of the D-Day beach landings complete with a granite Higgins boat & hedgehogs (the large metal obstacles that you see in the left side of the above photo.  Hitler used these on these beaches to make them harder to land boats on.)  The details of the bronze statues were amazing down to the Bible coming out of the fallen soldiers knapsack.

The beach scene also included spouts under the water that went off sporadically & made it seem like the "men" were under fire.  We all thought that was very cool!

I can’t stress enough how much I think every boy should study this topic & realize the sacrifice these men & veterans of other wars have made for OUR freedom.  Our earnest desire at Brookgreen Academy is to raise young men who would have the courage & selfless spirit to do what these men did & our prayer is that they never have to!