Arts of War on the Web

PublishingWorks, a New Hampshire book publisher, is looking for submissions from veterans for a book tentatively titled Moments of Honor, which will be published next Veterans Day.

The proposed book will contain 20-30 personal reminiscences, letters, and e-mails from veterans depicting experiences during conflicts from World War II to today. The submissions may be as long as 20 manuscript pages, or as short as a paragraph. The criteria are:

Victory/Loss
Fear/Courage
Honor/Regret
Love/Longing

E-mail your submission, or mail it, and include contact information (phone, address, e-mail), as well as a SASE. Do not send photos or any original material.

Send submissions to 151 Epping Road Exeter, NH 03833. Or email jeremy@publishingworks.com with “Veteran” in the subject line. Or call 603-778-9883 and ask for Jeremy or Carol. The deadline for submissions is March 1, 2010. And tell them you read about it here: at Vietnam Veterans of America’s Arts of War on the web page.

U.S. Army Major Greg Schrein, who is stationed at Fort Leavenworth and is working on his MA in Military History at the Command and General Staff College, has chosen the early advisory efforts in Vietnam (1955-62) as the focus of his thesis.  “I am specifically examining if experiences of advisers in Korea during the Korean War were transferred to the effort in Vietnam,” he told us.

For his research, Major Schrein would like to interview MAAG-V veterans “who may be interested in sharing some insight into the early efforts.” That especially includes people who served in both Korea (from 1949-43) and in Vietnam.

If you fit the bill and would like to help, send an email to: gregory.schrein@us.army.mil

And tell him you found about it here on VVA’s Arts of War on the web page.

Jeanne Giaimis at Rutgers University in Newark, New Jersey, is in the early stages of writing a book about African-American women who served in the military or in civilian jobs in Vietnam, Thailand, and Japan from 1954-75. “There have been no books written about this group,” Giaimis told us, “and I would therefore as a historian like to share their stories as a part of American history.”

As “a member of the baby boom generation, I am aware that younger generations have very little knowledge of the Vietnam War,” said said. “I would like to do my part to see that this chapter in our history is not forgotten.”

If you fit the bill and would like to be a part of the book, contact Giaimis at 201-675-6465 (cell); 973-353-3557 (work); or by email: giaimis@andromeda.rutgers.edu

If you do, tell her you read about her work right here at VVA’s Arts of War on the Web page.

Deborah McCabe, who created Military and Veteran Search in 2001 to help veterans find old buddies, is compiling a new edition of her book, Brotherhood. She would like to hear from Vietnam veterans who would like to contribute to the book by, among other things, writing a letter to the family of someone who never made it back or describing an act of bravery in battle.

You can learn more at her website or by emailing mavsnews@aol.com The deadline to contribute to the 2009 edition is August 15.

The organizers of “Salute,” a 4th of July art exhibit in Chicago’s historic Flat Iron Arts Building in the Wicker Park area, are looking for veteran artists. The event is billed as “The art show that celebrates patriotism, embodies the American experience and appreciates military personnel.”

The show is sponsored by The Flatiron Artist’s Association, a private, not-for-profit company dedicated to the promotion of the arts in the Wicker Park/Bucktown area. For more info, go to their web site.

If you did and you are a Vietnam veteran, Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker Jon Blair (the director of Anne Frank Remembered), would like to hear from you.

Blair is in pre-production on Is Everybody Alright?, a documentary based on the photographs of dozens of people along the route of Robert F. Kennedy’s funeral train in June 1968 by Magnum photographer Paul Fusco that are featured in his book RFK Funeral Train.

The film “will explore the interplay of personal memory and grand historical events of our time,” the filmmakers told us. “When hundreds of thousands of ordinary people gathered by the track side to watch Bobby Kennedy’s funeral train pass by, they were in essence seeking to reconcile their own feelings about where they and their country stood at this time of crisis and loss, at the same time as paying homage to the man himself, and what might have been if he had not been assassinated at the age of 42. Forty years on from the day when they were photographed from the Kennedy train by Paul Fusco, what has become of those people who stood on the tracks that day?”

If you’d like to help or to get more info, contact Sheila Maniar, the film’s American production coordinator, at 347-731-7504 or e-mail samaniar@earthlink.net

Patty Hardin has made it a point of thanking Vietnam veterans she meets for their service. Now the Long Beach, Washington-based writer is putting together a book of veterans’ stories for a book.

“It is important to me that these men and women are acknowledged in a positive way for their service to our country,” she told us.

If you’re interested in sharing a story, write to P.O. Box 212, Long Beach, WA 98631, email sharkey51@centurytel.net, or call 360-642-5801 or 360-244-2446

Greg Stern is a TV producer whose late father served at Long Binh Post from 1968-69. After his father’s death two years ago Stern found hundreds of pictures and letters and hours worth of recorded audio letters from his father and from friends and family among his father’s belongings.

The son is now is putting together a documentary based on that material.

“It was one point of his life I never knew about and sadly, I never asked,” Stern told us, “but finding this material has given me a second chance.”

Production on the doc has begun, and Stern is hoping to include moving images from other Vietnam veterans–of Long Binh as well as other in-country places–in the film. “Photographs are great,” he said, “but the rarer material is movie film, which I strive to include.”

The film, he said, “is not only about my father. I am including stories of other people connected, albeit in different ways, with the war. All had some mystery surrounding that time period followed by a discovery of material that led them to reflect and learn. Each will also hopefully get that closure we are looking for, which, for me, will be the film.”

If you have film of Long Binh that you’d be willing to lend to the movie, send an email to breakingthetapeprod@gmail.com and tell him you read it about here.

Jim Barker, who served as an adviser and linguist with MACV in II Corps in 1972, is putting together a book that will contain what he calls “comic and bizarre” in-country stories from Vietnam veterans. He’s calling the book Hotcakes and Fish Sauce, and will provide free copies to contributors upon its publication.

If you’re interested in contributing, email or write to Barker with your stories, along with your name, unit, MOS, area of operations, and time in country. You can reach him by email (erodemango@yahoo.com), by phone (408-401-7939) or by writing to 4941 Dickinson Drive, San Jose, CA 95111.

If you do, tell him you read about his book on this page.

Attention: Veterans of the Battle of Hamburger Hill (aka Hill 937 on Ap Bia Mountain) in May of 1969.

John DiConsiglio, a writer with Scholastic Press, which publishes books and magazines used in schools as teaching aides, is working on a book for high school students on Hamburger Hill.

“The book would focus on the real-life stories of real veterans,” DiConsiglio told us. “This style
connects well with kids. They are fascinated to hear real experiences rather than read from dry textbooks.”

He is therefore looking for veterans of that engagement who would like to share their stories for the book. “I’m trying to talk to as many people from as many different perspectives as I can,” he told us today (November 13). “Ideally, I would talk with them over the phone in the next few weeks. I’d try not to take up too much of their time.”

If you’d like to help, call 703-533-3758 or email john.diconsiglio@verizon.net