Godspeed, Darrell "Shifty" Powers

From Blackfive, with permission.

Airborne Icon and Hero Passes On - Godspeed, Darrell "Shifty" Powers

Posted By Blackfive

Update July 20th, 2009: Today we're doing a Virtual Memorial for Shifty Powers. Please blog, FaceBook and Twitter about Shifty. For Twitterers, at the WLF Twitter (@warriororg), we're using #shiftypowers to raise awareness.

"I could hear bullets and shrapnel hitting the plane. As I jumped out the door, I could see that the left motor was on fire." - Darrell Shifty Powers talking about jumping over Normandy, France, on D-Day.

Many, many of you have sent me notice that Shifty Powers of the heroic Easy Company, 2-506th PIR, 101st Airborne Division, died on June 17th. I had no idea that he had passed on. I have written here a lot about Easy Company and even have an autographed photo (Bill Guarnere) on my desk of the jump into Holland (Market Garden).

If you use GoogleNews (any combo of Darrell and/or Shifty Powers), there are less then ten notices of his death. There are less than four articles about his passing on from "old media" news agencies.

Reader Mark send the link to a NBC piece on Shifty. Good that they recognized him.

Quite frankly, this is an affront to a genuinely good man. Shifty Powers received two Bronze Stars and a CIB and fought in every campaign that Easy Company was in. He was severely injured on his way home in a truck accident (the irony is that the men of Easy rigged the lottery to go home so Shifty would be first, but he ended up being one of the last to get home after an extensive hospitalization).

This email has gone viral about Shifty:

We're hearing a lot today about big splashy memorial services.

I want a nationwide memorial service for Darrell "Shifty" Powers.

Shifty volunteered for the airborne in WWII and served with Easy Company of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, part of the 101st Airborne Infantry. If you've seen Band of Brothers on HBO or the History Channel, you know Shifty. His character appears in all 10 episodes, and Shifty himself is interviewed in several of them.

I met Shifty in the Philadelphia airport several years ago. I didn't know who he was at the time. I just saw an elderly gentleman having trouble reading his ticket. I offered to help, assured him that he was at the right gate, and noticed the "Screaming Eagle", the symbol of the 101st Airborne, on his hat.

Making conversation, I asked him if he'd been in the 101st Airborne or if his son was serving. He said quietly that he had been in the 101st. I thanked him for his service, then asked him when he served, and how many jumps he made.

Quietly and humbly, he said "Well, I guess I signed up in 1941 or so, and was in until sometime in 1945 . . . " at which point my heart skipped.

At that point, again, very humbly, he said "I made the 5 training jumps at Toccoa, and then jumped into Normandy . . . . do you know where Normandy is?" At this point my heart stopped.

I told him yes, I know exactly where Normandy was, and I know what D-Day was. At that point he said "I also made a second jump into Holland, into Arnhem." I was standing with a genuine war hero . . . . and then I realized that it was June, just after the anniversary of D-Day.

I asked Shifty if he was on his way back from France, and he said "Yes. And it's real sad because these days so few of the guys are left, and those that are, lots of them can't make the trip." My heart was in my throat and I didn't know what to say.

I helped Shifty get onto the plane and then realized he was back in Coach, while I was in First Class. I sent the flight attendant back to get him and said that I wanted to switch seats. When Shifty came forward, I got up out of the seat and told him I wanted him to have it, that I'd take his in coach.

He said "No, son, you enjoy that seat. Just knowing that there are still some who remember what we did and still care is enough to make an old man very happy." His eyes were filling up as he said it. And mine are brimming up now as I write this.

Shifty died on June 17 after fighting cancer.

There was no parade.

No big event in Staples Center.

No wall to wall back to back 24x7 news coverage.

No weeping fans on television.

And that's not right.

Let's give Shifty his own Memorial Service, online, in our own quiet way. Please forward this email to everyone you know. Especially to the veterans.

Rest in peace, Shifty.

"A nation without heroes is nothing." - Roberto Clemente

Here is a clip of the men of Easy Company (Shifty too) talking about heroes...

However, I particularly like this quote from his daughter...in the SWVA online edition:

...Johnson said her father kept a busy schedule up until the end. Two

years ago, he visited soldiers stationed in South Korea and Japan. Last

September, had he not fallen ill, he would have traveled to Iraq.

He kept a busy schedule up till the end. Two years ago, he visited
soldiers in South Korea and in Japan. Last September, had he not fallen
ill, he would have made a stop in Iraq.

“I had his suitcase packed,” Johnson said.

Missing the trip overseas disappointed him, she said, especially the worry of disappointing the soldiers there.

“My daddy was a simple man, not complicated and very comfortable with himself and approachable,” Johnson said. “He spoiled us. Right now I don’t feel as safe. I know I’ll never be as loved.”...

Godspeed, Shifty. I'm sure the Jumpmaster has you cleared on the manifest.

Airborne!!!

National D-Day Memorial -- A National Treasure!

On the drive between Blacksburg and Norfolk, Virginia, just off US-460 is the small town of Bedford, Virginia. This town lost more soldiers per capita on D-Day than just about any other town in America. Bedford, which is about 100 miles from the nearest large city, is tucked in the green magnificence of the Blue Ridge Mountains: surrounded by all of God's "mountain majesty". Bedford is also home to the National D-Day Memorial... stunningly beautiful, well crafted, reverent to the sacrifices and achievements of June 6, 1944. We had never heard of the Memorial, but it was the best 1-mile detour we have ever taken.

Others will blog today on the operational facts of D-Day and the meaning of D-Day and its (obvious) significance to the outcome of the war -- all of which the D-Day Memorial covers in detail -- but I will share the moving experience the National D-Day Memorial provided. Every regiment, battalion and division from every country that participated on D-Day on every one of the beachheads -- Juno, Omaha, Gold... is celebrated in a series of plaques -- and one for every destroyer, transport, carrier... and hundreds of brass plaques emblazoned with the names of every American killed on D-Day... and busts of the planners and leaders who saw the Allies to and through that horrific and eventually victorious day.

The National D-Day Memorial is set on 20 magnificent acres that contain a huge amphitheater with a mock of the Omaha landing with brass bodies strewn in water while air jets loudly spray the staccato sounds and effects of machine gun fire through the water... as a soldier pulls a buddy through the surf, one lies dead nearby and a trio of Marines struggle up the side of a netted hillside. All immortalized and honored in this Memorial. It is spectacularly landscaped with lush lawns and abundant trees and flowers... and benches and other places to sit and reflect... and perhaps remember those that were lost. When we were there, we saw a number of people shedding tears while running their hand over the name of a loved one on a plaque... and a message left in the guest book, "I miss you, Dad."

This privately founded and funded memorial is on the verge of bankruptcy -- many reasons -- cost, early mismanagement, maintenance... and Virginia legislators are planning to introduce legislation in the US Congress to turn this Memorial over to the US Parks Dept. I urge each of you to drop a quick note to your Congressperson and/or Senator drawing their attention to preserving and protecting this VERY deserving memorial. Or you may give a donation to save this Memorial at the National D-Day Memorial Foundation's site. Having been to the WWII Memorial and The Vietnam War Memorial, I assure you that the National D-Day Memorial is on par with those in its scope, its beauty and its message. We are a Nation of Memorials and Museums and this is a most important reminder of a Momentous day in our and the world's history.

I urge if you are anywhere near Bedford, Virginia please take the drive and visit this memorial -- and if you can't decide where to visit this summer, visit the D-Day Memorial and take the old folks and the kids along -- you will be so very glad you did!

the setting

the great arch is emblazoned "OVERLORD"

the names of the American fallen...

preparing for the 65th Anniversary

Leaders


honoring vessels...

scaling the cliffs

On June 6, 1944, 150,000 Allied soldiers clambered aboard heaving landing craft and braved six-foot swells, waves of machine gun fire, and more than 6 million mines to claim a stretch of sand at a place called Normandy. Their mission was to carve out an Allied foothold on the edge of Nazi-occupied Europe for the army of more than one million that would follow them in the summer of 1944. This army would burst forth from the beachhead, rolling across Europe into the heart of Germany, liberating millions, toppling a genocidal regime, and ending a nightmare along the way. But it all began on this beach in France, with an army of teenagers on a day called D-Day.

on the beach

leave no man behind