John Wayne

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It was July in Virginia, scent of the Dogwood and Laurel lay heavy on the land
while the burgeoning fruit of the peach and apple marked the full sway of summer.

For seven fateful days, the trees, the flowers, yes the ground itself, had shuddered,
under the roar of cannon, the bark of howitzers and the crackling of a legion of rifles.

Now all was silent, sledgehammer blows of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson,
had mauled the army of the Potomac, yet that army was not destroyed.

7 thousand men had fallen in that dreadful week and the savagery of the conflict
was grimly evident in the River of Wounded, that wound through the green hills.

Now a new sound drifted in the soft evening sky, for Colonel Dan Butterfield,
a courageous and able soldier, was also a man of music.

To honor his fallen comrades, had composed a simple and heart rending melody,
On July 2nd in the year of 1862, it's strings floated over the graves,
that scarred the dark Virginia earth.

It has been more than a hundred years since that song was born, those notes have never
died away, every night of the year, throughout the world, fighting men from America,
from the North and the South, the East and the West, close their eyes and sleep to it's call.
In each of their hearts, there glows a fierce surge of PRIDE.

(Other stories of the origin of Taps exist. A popular myth is that of a Northern boy who was killed fighting for the South. His father, Robert Ellicombe, a captain in the Union Army, came upon his son's body on the battlefield and found the notes to Taps in a pocket of the dead boy's Confederate uniform. There is no evidence to back up thestory or the existence of a Captain Ellicombe.)

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AMERICA, WHY I LOVE HER

Narrated by John Wayne

You ask me Why I Love Her?
Well, give me time and I'll explain.
Have you seen a Kansas sunset
Or an Arizona rain?
Have you drifted on a bayou
Down Louisiana way?
Have you watched a cold fog drifting
Over San Francisco Bay?
Have you heard a bobwhite calling
In the Carolina pines,

Or heard the bellow of a diesel
At the Appalachia mines?
Does the call of Niagara thrill you
When you hear her waters roar?
Do you look with awe and wonder
At her Massachusetts shore,
Where men who braved a hard new world
First stepped on Plymouth's rock?
And do you think of them when you stroll
Along a New York City dock?
Have you seen a snowflake drifting
In the Rockies, way up high?

Have you seen the sun come blazing down
From a bright Nevada sky?
Do you hail to the Columbia
As she rushes to the sea,
Or bow your head at Gettysburg
At our struggle to be free?
Have you seen the mighty Tetons?
Have you watched an eagle soar?
Have you seen the Mississippi
Roll along Missouri's shore?

Have you felt a chill at Michigan
When on a winter's day
Her waters rage along the shore
In thunderous display?
Does the word "Aloha" make you warm?
Do you stare in disbelief
When you see the surf
Come roaring in at Waimea Reef?
From Alaska's cold to the Everglades,

From the Rio Grande to Maine,
My heart cries out, my pulse runs fast
At the might of her domain.
You ask me Why I Love Her?
I've a million reasons why:
My Beautiful America,
Beneath God's wide, wide sky.

~ John Mitchum ~

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Our son was born so long ago,
Yet it seems like yesterday
That I stood in awe before his crib
And heard that doctor say,
"You've quite a boy there, Mister Jones."
For in his being there
I saw the miracle of God.

Later, in his high chair,
In a manner I deplore,
I saw that "miracle of God"
Throw his oatmeal on the floor.
Well, I fixed him something different,
For I felt he must be fed,
But when I turned around again,
That bowl was on his head!

A few more years rolled along
And he didn't spill things anymore.
But his granddad sent a big bass drum,
And once more I deplored
The fact that my miracle of God
Had a lusty taste for noise.
When he'd boom! boom! boom!
On that big bass drum,
I questioned, "Boys must be boys?"

I asked his whereabouts one day.
His mom said, "He's got a paper route.
Said he'd help to earn his way
As he became an Eagle Scout."
When they pinned that medal on him,
Tears welled in my eyes,
And then I gripped his mother's hand...
Our boy had earned his prize.

I won't forget that September day
When he entered senior high.
He had an air of great excitement,
But he left home with a sigh.
He came back that afternoon
And gave us some puzzled looks.
"Wow!" he said, "This school is tough--
Look at all these books!"

"The choice is yours," his mother said;
"You can pick the easy way.
What you put into life
You'll get out of it.
Each man pays his price one day."
He looked up...and then he smiled,
And I saw he'd lost his gloom.
He said, "I'd better look at these,"
And he headed for his room.

My son came home late one day.
He seemed all worn out.
I asked a little sharply
What this was all about.
He spoke proudly and threw his shoulders back,
And in his eyes I caught a gleam.
"I wanted to surprise you, Dad:
I'm on the football team!"

They won most of their games...lost a few...
It was a thrill to watch him play.
And when they didn't win, we knew
He'd met the challenge anyway.
He didn't know it at the time,
But it was a stepping-stone...
Solid footing for the climb
To face life on his own.

How those three years flew past!
When graduation came,
We saw our boy grown up at last.
Our lives will never be the same.
I guess we've known all along
What his goal would be...
From that time three years ago
When he chose responsibility.

He stood in the doorway yesterday,
Put out a strong right hand.
I held back tears at the uniform
He wore to protect his land.
I shook his hand. His mother cried,
"Son, why couldn't you wait?"
Embracing her, he softly said,
"Mom, if we all did, it would be too late.

"I promise I'll go back to school
When I've met my obligation
To you--my friends-my girl--my school--
And most of all, this nation.
I'll do all I can out there,
For I know you'll both be trying
To make everyone you know aware
We've gotta keep Old Glory flying."

And then his mother straightened up.
With a smile to hide a tear,
She said, "We're both so proud of you!
We'll feel lost without you here.
Someday, you'll know what this moment means,
When your boy shakes your hand...
And you watch him as he walks away...
The day he becomes a man."

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Face the Flag of stars and bars,
Of red and white and blue,
A flag that guarantees the rights
For men like me and you.

Face the flag, son; read what's written there
The history, the progress, and the heritage we share
Our flag reflects the past, son, but stands for so much more
And in this age of Aquarius, it still flies in the fore.

It leads the forward movement shared by all mankind
To learn, to love, to live with peace in mind
To learn the mysteries of space, as well as those of earth
To love each man for what he is, regardless of his birth.

To live without the fear of reprisal for belief
To ease the the tensions of the world that cries out for relief.

Face the Flag of stars and bars,
Of red and white and blue,
A flag that guarantees the rights
For men like me and you

Face the flag, son; take a good long look
What you're seeing now can't be found in any history book
It's the present and the future so; it's being written now
And you're the one to write it, but the flag can show you how.

Do you know what it stands for? What it's makers meant?
To think, to speak, the privilege of dissent
To think our leaders might be wrong, to stand and tell them so
These are things that other men under other flags will never know.

But, responsibility, that's the cross that free men must bear
And if you don't accept that, the freedom isn't there.

Face the Flag of stars and bars,
Of red and white and blue,
A flag that guarantees the rights
For men like me and you.

Face the flag, son, and face reality
Our strengths and our freedoms are based in unity
The flag is but a symbol, son, of the world's greatest nation
And as long as it keeps flying, there's cause for celebration.

So do what you've got to do, but always keep in mind
A lot of other people believe in peace, but there are the other kind
If we want to keep these freedoms, we may have to fight again
God forbid, but if we do, let's always fight to win.

For the fate of a loser is futile and it's bare
No love, no peace, just misery and despair.

Face the flag, son, and thank God it's still there.

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