Villager Bill MacNeill will be one of 25 local World War II veterans embarking Sunday on a trip to Washington D.C., courtesy of Villages Honor Flight.
The 88-year-old Village of Calumet Grove resident is coping with the onset of dementia.
Even so, he is looking forward to the trip which will take he and his fellow veterans to see the war memorials in our nation’s capitol.
He was a young man in Michigan when the country went to war.
“I had intended to go into the Navy, but the Army sent me that little piece of paper first that said, ‘You are hereby inducted,” MacNeill said.
After basic training, he was shipped to the South Pacific, specifically the Island of Bouganville. Then it was on to New Guinea and finally Japan.
“It was a long trip,” he said. “And on that trip, we didn’t know what was going to happen. And that was just before the surrender of Japan. We were somewhere on the water when we got the news that Japan had surrendered.”
So rather than going ashore as an invading force, they went in as an occupying force.
“It was an army of occupation activity. You did what Uncle Sam said you should do,” he said. “But we were welcomed over there.”
It didn’t take long for the Japanese to realize that the American soldiers weren’t the monsters that their government had portrayed.
At the conclusion of his service, MacNeill came home to Detroit, where he eventually would get a job at Chevrolet.
He met a young gal and almost immediately asked her to elope.
They will have been married 67 years come this October.
And when he returns from that long day on Honor Flight it will be his wife waiting in the parking lot of American Legion Post 347. She will be there with their only child, Darlene Bell. Darlene and her husband recently bought a house in The Villages to be closer to her parents.
Honor Flight Homecoming Celebration
The homecoming for the Sept. 8 flight starts with entertainment at 11:30 p.m. by Diamonds and Spurs. The Village Cheerleaders, Twirlers and Clowns will be there to greet the buses and veterans when they arrive, at about 12:20 am.
“It is a late arrival but it will be a rousing patriotic event and we hope you will be part of it to welcome home this group of American war heroes,” said John Driscoll of Honor Flight. “Bring a flag, a chair and a friend (but no alcohol as it jeopardizes the liquor license of the American Legion Post 347 who graciously open their Post to us.)”
To see a video from the June Honor Flight homecoming, check the link below:
http://villages-news.com/villages-honor-flight-receives-patriotic-welcome-home-in-wee-hours/
