I’m 69 years old, and grew up in eastern North Carolina near Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base. Now I’ve heard of many soldiers being stationed on Okinawa. But only tonight as I am watching an old “black & white” movie called, “Okinawa,” has it sunk in that Okinawa is an island, a part of Japan. I guess through all these years, I knew Okinawa was near Japan, but it never sunk in that it was Japan.

Oh, and Lejeune was always pronounced LEE-JUNE, never Lay-Jurn as it is now pronounced. My mother worked many years on Base, as did my Uncle Bob. She as a Clerk-Typist, and he, as a painter. *Maybe we could remind folks, that in North Carolina , Beaufort is pronounced “Bowfort” and in South Carolina it’s pronounced “Bewfurt”. If the man wants his name pronounced correctly, that’s one thing, but the Marine Base in North Carolina, where many “locals” worked for many, many, many years, it will forever be “Camp LEE-JUNE”. Well, unless the Government steps in and makes you change your pronunciation of “Fort Bragg” to “Fort Liberty.”

And most of the Christian Marines that I knew, believed that victory lay in the Hand of God, and not in the might of their Hum-Vees, Tanks, Bazookas or M16s.

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I’ve known and been good friends with Jeff Mitchell since 1985 or so, and with his family through the years, but only recently asked him if he ever travelled and saw the sights while he was in the Marines. He surprised me (although he may have told me this before), but he did go out exploring the various parts of the World he as travelling through. He said he visited many ornate churches and saw a bunch of wonderous architecture. He tells the story of one time, going in to play on a “what he thought was a public tennis court” but the caretaker came out enraged because Jeff had messed up the court (a clay or composite court I am guessing). Jeff was apologetic to the man telling him the gate was open and he thought it a public facility.