Published: July 04, 2008 02:18 pm      

VIDEO STORY: Honor Flight

They made an unlikely parade.

Some were in wheelchairs or pushing walkers. Those who walked moved slowly to keep pace with their comrades, but all seemed to carry themselves with a certain bearing, energized perhaps by the burning embers of a time when they were young and strong and charged with saving the world.

As they disembarked from their Southwest Airlines plane and moved into the Baltimore concourse, someone made an announcement that the Honor Flight had landed carrying World War II veterans to see the Washington, D.C., monument created to honor their service.

The applause thundered from the crowded terminal and harried travelers stopped as if frozen in time, creating a living, breathing, noisy gauntlet of gratitude for the gray-haired men and women to pass through.

It was the remarkable start to an extraordinary trip that one veteran called “the best day of my life.”

Recently, 30 local veterans of World War II, including nine former prisoners of war, flew free of charge to the monument through an Ohio organization called Honor Flight, created to fly as many vets as possible to the monument before there are no longer any left alive.

From the Buffalo Niagara International Airport, where they received an early morning send-off complete with honor guard, to the end of the day meal at the Golden Corral buffet in Maryland, people cheered for them.

“It was like a wonderful dream,” said Larry Fama of the Town of Tonawanda, an 83-year-old former Navy radioman. “It was like a parade we never had. Not that we needed it or wanted it, but just that it was such a wonderful surprise.”

On the steamy day that the local contingent headed to the monument, several other busloads of Honor Flight vets from Michigan and New Jersey were also in attendance. The monument, a rectangle of fountains and sculptures, was awash in blue Honor Flight T-shirts as vets enjoyed the cooling mist from the fountain spray and the monument built within eyesight of the Lincoln Memorial.

North Tonawanda veteran Harry Kuligowski, who led the first charge to bring Honor Flight to Western New York, was asked to place a wreath at the New York state pillar, one of 50 built to honor each of the states in the union. The 80-year-old vet gently placed the wreath at the base of the pillar in honor of his comrades who never made it home. He stood back and sharply saluted.

Kuligowski, after seeking help from local politicians and news media, met up with Debbie Mellon, the director of the Friends and Family Support group at the Niagara Falls Air Base. Mellon, already busy with her full-time communications job at the base and her volunteer leadership of the military support group, agreed to take on the job of organizing the inaugural flight.

For Mellon, it was a little like being a general planning an invasion. She had to meet with airport officials to plan the celebrations as the vets left and returned and hold training sessions for the guardians, who paid $200 each for the honor of tending a vet on the trip. Then there was the matter of making sure there were plenty of wheelchairs, even for those vets who typically didn’t use them. Meals had to be arranged and coach buses had to be leased.

“It was as good as it gets,” said Honor Flight founder Earl Morse, who flew on the region’s inaugural flight. “If the guardians are behind this and revere and respect the veterans, everything else falls into place.”

It was Morris, a physician’s assistant at a veteran’s clinic in Ohio and retired air force captain, who came up with the idea after talking to his patients about the new monument. He came to understand that most would never see the monument without help, both physically and financially.

As a pilot, he was able to fly one vet to the monument. Then another. He started to ask other pilots for help. Eventually, small planes couldn’t handle the numbers, and he turned to non-profit groups for help.

Today, Honor Flight has a network of about 70 participating programs across the country, each anchored by a non-profit organization which accepts donations for future flights in their communities. About 8,000 WWII veterans have been flown to the monument.

This day, Morse, who flies on all the inaugural flights, led the Niagara group like a chiseled cheerleader, always at the front of the bus urging the vets to drink their bottled water and reminding the guardians to take a especially keen watch of their charges on the bus steps.

“Earl, you’re a great man,” someone called out during the bus ride. “No, no,” Morse said. “I get to hang out with great men and women. That’s the real benefit to this.”

Among the guardians who labored in the record-breaking heat, pulling wheelchairs on and off buses at every stop and tending to every need of the veterans, were state Sen. George Maziarz and Niagara County Republican Chairman Henry Wojtaszek. Maziarz was one of the first politicians Kuligowski approached about bringing Honor Flight to the area, and the senator liked the idea so much he decided to volunteer as a “guardian.” Quote from the video

And while the veterans, one after the other, declared the day a success, it seemed the guardians, who worked so hard to move the contingent forward, were the most appreciate of the chance to fly.

“If it weren’t for Honor Flight, we wouldn’t be here,” said Sharon Lindsay, who was the guardian to her father, Conrad Skarbek, from the Town of Tonawanda. “We’ve been trying for two years to get him here. He’s been in really bad health. He’s been having problems one after the other.”

Skarbek’s granddaughter and her husband, Kate and Rick Kraft of Wheatfield, surprised him by showing up at the Buffalo airport after purchasing tickets to fly on the same Southwest flight that carried the Honor Flight contingent.

Isabel Messing, 84, of Niagara Falls, was the only female veteran on the Niagara Honor Flight. She admitted that the trip made her feel “a little sentimental and weepy.”

“I was just a kid. All my friends went into the service. A lot of my friends were killed,” said Messing, who served as a member of the Women’s Army Corps.

“I almost didn’t make it here,” said Dudley Oldham of Lockport. “My legs are bad.”

Oldham’s wheelchair was powered by the energy of his son, Tom Oldham of Olcott, who accompanied his father as a guardian because “I wanted to share the monument with him, and I wanted to share the stories.”

There were plenty of stories to share. POW Don Griffin of Cheektowaga took some time out at dinner to recall his time in a German POW camp. He said he could still clearly remember the moment two angry Nazi guards stormed his barracks.

The prisoners had been whittling away at the floor for shreds of wood to burn and heat their contraband food. The guards fell through the weakened floor.

“They went in to their knees. I can still see them,” he said, chuckling at the memory.

Humor and dogged determination seemed to be the order of the day for the veterans who spent about 17 rigorous hours on the memorial adventure.

“We dealt with D-Day, I guess we can deal with this heat,” joked one vet of the 90-degree temperatures.

The veterans returned late at night to the Buffalo airport for one last round of cheering and “welcome home signs.” Erie County Executive Chris Collins was there to greet them, along with a crowd of well-wishers waving and draped in red, white and blue. Morse told the vets only one thing was asked of them.

“Tell your friends,” Morse told them. “Go back to your towns and VFW posts and tell everybody about what took place today.”

Morse, who like Kuligowski started the whole journey, have hopes that word of mouth will help to find a local non-profit organization to carry forth the next phase of the local Honor Flight mission and accept donations.

“We don’t have anything to give to you,” Morse told the vets. “This is the only thing we have left to give.”

Contact editor Michele DeLucaat 693-1000, ext. 157.