SC
| dialogue
A hero remembers anniversary of one of my best days as part of the electric cooperative movement. On April 11, 2012, South Carolina’s electric cooperatives sponsored an Honor Flight where 100 veterans of World War II flew to Washington, D.C., to visit the monuments erected in their honor. Co-op representatives, including me, were among the contingent that went along as guardians. It was powerful and moving for all of us to witness these heroes being celebrated. For many of those veterans, it was a last opportunity to receive such a level of deserved appreciation. Most of them have passed on since that day, but we have found several Richard Damron, wearing the 3rd Marine Division hat he wore on the 2012 Honor Flight, shows a photo who are still with us. One of them is captured while he spoke to a group of middle school students from Utah on the trip. Richard Damron. If you’ve been a faithful reader of this column for the past decade, you may remember that After finishing his tour in Guam and China, Damron was Mr. Damron made an impression on me at the Tomb of the discharged in 1946 and returned home to marry his first love, Unknown Soldier. That day, he told a group of middle school Jerrie. The two will soon celebrate 76 years of marriage. students from Utah, at the prompting of their teacher, about He returned to military service, this time as a radar operahis experience on Iwo Jima as his 3rd Marine Division helped tor in the Air Force, from which he retired in 1966. secure the island for the Allies. By 2012, he and Jerrie had moved to York to be near their “I just remember telling them that this is a wonderful children. He had always wanted to go to Arlington, Virginia, country,” Damron recounted in February. “We did it for them, and visit the Marine Corps Memorial, which depicts the iconic and it is in their hands what happens in the future.” flag raising on Mount Suribachi. Once he heard about the Now 96, Damron’s recollections of that day in Washington, Honor Flight through his cooperative, York Electric, he didn’t as well as the battle in the Pacific, remain sharp and prohesitate to apply. Ten years later, it’s still a memory he holds dear. found. He says his brigade landed about five days after “It was a wonderful, wonderful trip,” he says. “The honor the American flag was mounted atop Mount Suribachi. He of associating with 100 people who did the same thing, had remembers the black, volcanic sand was so fine it would fall the same feeling that I had—you just can’t take that away.” back into the holes American troops were digging. He remembers the carnage and its stench from one of the war’s deadliest battles, something he says no 19-year-old should have to witness. But he also remembers being restored by the vision of his country’s flag waving above them. “You could get up out of your foxhole and look up on Mount Suribachi,” he says. “Normally, there was enough of a breeze that it was unfurled. Such a beautiful piece of red, MIKE COUICK President and CEO, white and blue cloth. It made me feel love for America.” The Electric Cooperatives of South Carolina THIS MONTH MARKS THE 10TH
SOUTH CAROLINA LIVING | APRIL 2022 | SCLIVING.COOP
JOS H P. C ROT ZE R
8
