Second Honor Flight takes veterans to D.C.

WORLD WAR II MONUMENT:
Guardians wheel the Honor Flight veterans through the nation’s war memorials.

This weekend, June 19-21, four South County residents will accompany a group of World War II veterans on an Honor Flight to see and visit the nation's war memorials in Washington, D.C.

It will be the second such trip in as many months for Debbi and Tom Johnson of Anderson and Robert Burroughs of Cottonwood. However, it will be the first such trip for Robert Burroughs, Jr., 16, a junior at West Valley High School.

The South County foursome will join up Friday, June 19, with others from the Honor Flight Northern California team at the San Francisco International Airport just prior to departure for Washington Dulles International Airport.

The itinerary for this trip will be very similar to the first Honor Flight that took place May 8-10 of this year, almost one year after the organization formed a hub in Yountville on May 19, 2008.

On her first Honor Flight in Oct. 2007, Debbi Johnson was able to serve as a guardian for her terminally ill father, a World War II veteran who made his first-ever visit to the World War II memorial in the nation's capital.

"It's a lot of work to do this, but these guys come back changed people," said Tom Johnson, who is the group's chief financial officer. His wife Debbi serves as secretary on the organization's board of directors.

The Anderson couple used some of her inheritance after her father died to get the organization on its feet. Both agree that it was money well invested because of the profound changes that the program brings about in those veterans who make the trip back east.

"Some of the veterans will talk a lot about their war experiences until they get to the monuments, and then they will be speechless as they see all of the names of those who died," Debbi Johnson said. "Others will be really quiet until we visit the monuments, and then they will break down in tears and let all of their bottled up emotions about the war just come flowing out."

Each of the Honor Flight guardians — there are three guardians for every eight veterans since so many of the veterans are in wheelchairs — pays $300 towards their own airfare and donates their time for the entire three-day weekend.

"It's a healing thing. It is closure. We encourage the veterans to leave their war experiences behind at the national monuments in Washington, D.C. So many of these guys, and even some of the women, have been carrying the ghosts of their dead buddies with them for more than 60 years," explained Tom Johnson.

Since many of the veterans, upon arriving home from war as young soldiers did not participate in victory parades or even receive a card of "thanks, well done" or a pat on the back from the communities to which they returned, a group of Patriot Guards will send off or greet the entourage at each stop along the way, said Robert Burroughs, Sr.

"When we arrive in Dulles, there will be hundreds of people clapping their hands and cheering for them. They will walk through a long aisle of American flags. You should see the looks on their faces. Some of them wil have tears while others are grinning ear to ear," Burroughs said.

"It is often the first time they have received congratulations and thanks for their military service," he added.

Veterans who apply for the program travel and stay free of charge. However, first-priority status is given to those veterans who are the most infirm and the most aged since World War II veterans, now in their mid-80s, are dying at the rate of 1,200 per day.

Those interested in donating to the nonprofit organization or volunteering as a guardian for a future Honor Flight Northern California may do so by going online to www.honorflightnorcal.org