So, I'm moving up tomorrow's scheduled blog post to today, as tomorrow is the day of rememberance for Veterans Day.  Here's the link to last year's blog post that is being heavily viewed overnite, (click here.)

Last year I was prompted to blog after seeing that CNN was airing their morning program from the deck of the USS Intrepid.  That ship is part of the Museum in Manhattan that Tina and I saw on a past trip to the Big Apple Con's "The National" comic book convention. The photo I used in last year's blog post showed several different exhibits at the Museum, including: The USS Intrepid Aircraft Carrier, the USS Growler Nuclear Submarine, and the Concorde.

Tomorrow is our nation's day for honoring all of the Veterans that have served the country throughout its' history.

As you can see from the above two pictures, my Dad and Grandfather both served their Country.  (As well as multiple ancestors; plus earlier and current family members including uncles, nephews and now nieces!)

My dad served in the US Navy for 21 years.  One of his earlier cruises was on the USS Yorktown, a sister ship to the USS Intrepid that was pictured in last year's blog post.  So touring the USS Intrepid was 'like' looking at the same ship my dad served on those many years ago. My Dad's ship, the USS Yorktown has also been converted to a museum, and is ported in Patriots Point, Charleston Harbor, South Carolina.

My dad's dad was also a veteran, serving for his country in WWI. Ollie Hamersky, served under General John J Pershing in Europe, and made it back home after being gassed in the trenches. Unfortunately his childhood buddy, Henry Zerener, (the shorter man in the photo with him at left), never left Camp Funston at Fort Riley, KS.  Henry died from one of the illnesses that was rampant in the States during 1918.

So today, this blog post is dedicated to them, my other past and present family members, And to all the men and women who have served in our armed forces during our nation's history!

As for the comic book connection... War comics have been part of our heritage since even before the USA entered into WWII.

Captain America and other USA patriotic super-heroes in early 1941 helped shape America's thinking about what was going on in Europe before the bombing of Pearl Harbor December 7th.  Captain America was shown punching Adolf Hitler on the cover of  Captain America Comics #1. 

Which by the way, was just featured on the November 8th episode of 'Brothers & Sisters'!  Did You catch that?  Scotty Wandell's father Wally is shown to be a long time comic book collector, and gives Scotty a copy of Captain America #1 at the end of the episode so Scotty and Kevin can sell it and then start their family...

Anyways, the comic book cover I chose to adorn the top left of this blog post is just one of thousands that I have owned during my many years of collecting. It was probably due to the fact that aircraft carriers like the one shown on the cover were the biggest man made objects I had seen or been in during my early childhood that made me pick that one up. (The comic is from January 1958.)  On the West Coast and in the Midwest when I visited family back there, there weren't any skyscrapers, so aircraft carriers made a BIG impression on me!

As also previously blogged about, it was my Aunt Marge and Uncle Howard McIntosh that really started me on reading comics.  However my own personal comics collection grew to  a much larger size while our family was stationed at the USN base on Kodiak Island 1963-1966.

That's because that other than fishing or hunting or crabbing, there just wasn't much else to do on an Island that only had a few miles of roads!  Plus at the Navy Base barbershop there were all kinds of comics to read and exchange with!  Yeah, Marvel Comics were hitting it big during that time, but with spotty distribution to Navy Bases, I couldn't always get the next 'continued story' issue, so I also read other comics but exchanged them back for Marvels when available!

Anyways, enough going off on another tangent here this morning...  As you have seen from the above,  Veterans Day, veterans, and war comic books mean something to me.  And No, I'm not a 'hawk' or even a 'dove'.  I just appreciate that comic books have not always been about 'super-heroes'!

My thanks to the veterans, and those veterans that also came back and worked in comics and added a sense of realism into the comic books that they had a hand in creating.