Alert to 515th Field Artillery Battalion Veterans
and
Family Members
I am interested in accomplishing several things with this project. Some of these goals are listed below. Please let me know if you are able to help me with any of these. I would like to make this a community project that all people with connections to the 515th can be proud of. I can reached at:
1. 515th Contacts: If you know of 515th veterans or their family members and can either pass the above information on to them or let me know how to contact them, I would appreciate it.
2. 515th Experiences: If you are a 515th veteran, I would be quite interested in your memories and perspectives from your time in the unit. You can send this information to me. If you have a friend or family member who could interview you and send that information to me, I could include that information under the Vets Page of the website. If you are a family member of a 515th veteran who has passed away and you have stories to pass along, parts of letters or diaries, I would be interested in this information as well. Please contact me so we could discuss how to format the information. The more stories we can include the better the website will be.
3. 515th Photos: If you have photos from the unit, I would be interested in receiving copies of those photos to include in the website. There are several ways in which this can be approached. Original photos can be sent me. After scanning them, I can send them back. If that seems a little risky, I could receive copies of photos to scan and put on the website. These would need to be of high quality resolution. Simple photocopied photos will not scan well enough to put on the site. The other option would be to send me photos as attachments via email. If one decides to do this, please contact me first and I will have the webmaster – Erik – talk to you about the format, etc.
4. 515th Re-Connections: I don’t know if it would be possible to put together some sort of 515th association, but I figure that many veterans out there would like to be reconnected after all these years. I don’t think it wise to just list names and addresses on the website, but I could establish a list at my home of veterans who would like to be contacted and act as a clearing house for those contacts. If anyone is interested in establishing some sort of association, even if informal, for the 515th, please let me know.
5. 515th Reunion ?: Last year I was able to help put together a Veterans Day event at the school where I am principal. We had over 60 veterans in attendance of which about 40 were WWII veterans. We even had a 515th veteran – Mr. Earl Bage. We had hopes of possibly putting together a mini-515th reunion, but there wasn’t enough time to pull it off. I would still like to try something like this and would be interested in organizing it. I already have a plan as to where it could take place and what could happen at it. If anyone is interested, please let me know.
6. Other Thoughts/Ideas: I would be most interested in hearing from any 515th veterans or family members regarding thoughts or ideas in relation to any of the above. As mentioned earlier, I would like to make this a community project – not just something of my own doing. In years to come, it would be great for future generations to be able to look up this website and find what their grandfathers, great-uncles, etc. did during the war.
I look forward to hearing from many 515th folk! Once again, please email me at: