Podcast Summary

Podcast: All Of It (WNYC)
Host: Koosha Navadar (in for Alison Stewart)
Episode: Commemorating the 80th Anniversary of D-Day with Stories of Veterans
Date: June 11, 2024
Guest: Garrett M. Graff, author of When the Sea Came Alive: An Oral History of D-Day

Episode Overview

This episode commemorates the 80th anniversary of D-Day by making space for personal remembrances from families, descendants, and the dwindling number of remaining veterans who were there. Through live calls and texts, listeners share firsthand and secondhand accounts of D-Day, engaging with Garrett M. Graff, whose new book collects hundreds of first-person voices to construct an oral history of this pivotal day. The discussion revolves around why these stories matter, how they shape our understanding of the past, and the importance of preserving them as living memory fades.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Power and Purpose of Oral History

Guest: Garrett M. Graff (03:15 – 07:51)

• Why Oral History for D-Day?
  • Graff explains the importance of documenting first-person memories at this pivotal moment, noting that we are nearing the point when no one who experienced D-Day firsthand will be alive to share their stories.
  • He emphasizes capturing a spectrum of voices, including Allied troops, leaders (Churchill, Eisenhower), British and French civilians, and even German defenders.
  • "The power of oral history...is it puts you back in the footsteps of those who are living that moment, knowing only the things that they know at the time." — Garrett M. Graff (06:04)
  • Oral history allows us to dispel myths of heroism and neat narrative, revealing instead fear, uncertainty, and the weight of the unknown.

2. Personal, Ordinary, and Extraordinary Memories

Host: Koosha Navadar
Listener Calls (08:20 – 14:31)

• Highlight: Amy, Granddaughter of a Pathfinder

  • Amy shares stories of her grandfather Herbert Turner, a Jewish Pathfinder from Brooklyn, who set up communications for incoming troops. He was proud to serve, especially as a Jew helping liberate Europe, and was later honored by Congress.
  • "He would never tell us about combat or if he was scared, but he would tell us about the guys in his group... and the places they went in France." — Amy (08:54)

• Graff puts their contributions into historical context:

  • Only about 200 of the 13,000 paratroopers dropped inland were Pathfinders.
  • Paratroopers often fought isolated from the main action, not knowing the larger battle's outcome or even if the invasion had truly begun.
  • "D-Day is 167,000 individual stories...every single person...has their own little slice of that story that exists almost exclusively, without context to the larger invasion." — Garrett M. Graff (12:39)

3. Unpacking D-Day: What Does the ‘D’ Stand For?

Listener Question: Bonnie (16:27 – 18:42)

• Graff explains that "D-Day" is a generic military planning term dating to WWI, meaning literally "day-day"—the start day of any operation. While many D-Days occurred, June 6, 1944, overshadowed all others due to its unprecedented scale.

"D-Day...is a scale of operation that just boggles the mind. More than a million Allied personnel in motion...7,000 ships, the largest armada ever assembled." — Garrett M. Graff (17:29)

4. Untold Stories: Codebreakers and POWs

Listeners: Jacqueline, Mitchell (18:55 – 21:46)

• Jacqueline's stepfather, Seymour Lilker, was a cryptographer who worked with Alan Turing and landed in the second wave on D-Day to capture German coastal code books.

• Mitchell recounted his stepfather Artie Cohn’s experience:

  • Landed on Omaha Beach; spent nine months as a POW.
  • Never spoke of his experiences for 55 years, only sharing after PTSD therapy.
  • "They turned me into a murderer. He didn’t know the people but it was kill or be killed." — Mitchell relaying his stepfather's words (21:23)

• Graff on Generational Reticence:

  • Many WWII veterans never shared their stories until decades later, affected by what we now know as PTSD.

"This was a generation that...came back from the war and did not talk about it often for decades, if at all." — Garrett M. Graff (22:23)

5. The Experience of Black Soldiers

Listener: Ginger (24:34 – 26:53)

• Ginger shared her father Elza McKnight’s experience in an all-Black segregated ammunition unit on Utah Beach. Europeans greeted them warmly—an unfamiliar experience for Black Americans from the segregated South.

• Her father bonded with fellow soldiers at small, unheralded reunions and left behind a scrapbook. He refused to watch Saving Private Ryan due to the absence of Black soldiers depicted in the film.

• Graff on Segregation in WWII:

  • Of 1.4 million Americans sent to Britain, about 130,000 were Black, experiencing less discrimination from the British than in the U.S.
  • Recounts the story of Waverly Woodson, a Black WWII medic who treated 200 men on Omaha Beach despite being wounded and was belatedly awarded the Distinguished Service Cross in 2024.

"In my book...there are just two photos of individual soldiers from D-Day. Waverly Woodson is one...our country still owes a good, bigger debt to than we have paid." — Garrett M. Graff (32:14)

• Memorable Quote
  • "I think that was perhaps the first time we got the message there was a new world ahead of us."
    — Quoting Private J. Robert Patterson, from Graff's book (33:58)

6. Liberation and the Civilian Perspective

Listener: Flora (34:12 – 37:01)

• Flora, a hidden Jewish child in France, described liberation by American soldiers, the emotion of hugging their liberators, and being given chocolates.
• Her mother was murdered in Auschwitz; Flora was ultimately adopted by an English-speaking couple after the war.
• Shared a moving anecdote of returning a soldier’s gloves to his lover in the U.S.

7. More Listener Stories: The Web of D-Day Connections

Selected Calls and Texts (38:45 – 43:39)

• Chris recalled his father Bidwell Moore, a West Point graduate, who survived D-Day because his transport was disabled and went on to witness other battles and the end of the war in Hitler’s bunker.
• Alan spoke of his father, Nathan Swordlow, a B17 navigator detached in a ditching near Ireland before D-Day, later working at Los Alamos and succumbing to plutonium-related cancer.
• Ann shared her father's harrowing Omaha Beach landing, his role as a swimmer and radio retriever, and that he only opened up decades later after being honored in France.

8. Remembering Both the Fallen and the Survivors

Host & Guest Reflection (43:39 – 49:17)

• Graff emphasizes the challenge of memorializing the dead in oral history but includes letters from soldiers who later died.
• Recurring themes: the youth of those who served, the impact of trauma, and the fact that for many, D-Day was just the beginning of further hardship.

"D-Day was just the beginning, not the end...everyone who made it ashore survived June 6, had to get up on the morning of June 7 and fight all over again." — Garrett M. Graff (45:41)

9. The Emotional Legacy and Passing on the Story

Closing Reflections (46:52 – 49:53)

• Graff and Navadar discuss the pride and trauma expressed by veterans, and the importance of passing their memories to future generations.
• Graff reflects on the task of "keeping these stories alive" as firsthand accounts disappear.

"You can’t help but do a project like this and then feel a real debt of history to try to keep these stories alive." — Garrett M. Graff (49:11)

"D-Day was an experience you would never want to live through again. But I am glad I was there." — Private Buddy Mazara, quoted by Graff (47:07)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On D-Day’s Scale:
  "D-Day is the biggest thing humans have ever done and may ever do." — Graff (17:45)

• On Individual Experience:
  "All they knew were the one hedgerow, the one foxhole, the one stretch of beach that they fought in during that day." — Graff (13:44)

• On Segregated Units:
  "The British government actually puts out official notices...saying, we’re not going to do anything to enforce American segregation here." — Graff (28:34)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [03:15] Graff explains oral history approach
• [08:30] Amy shares her grandfather’s Pathfinder story
• [12:39] Graff contextualizes the Pathfinder’s role and D-Day as many individual stories
• [16:27] Explaining "D-Day"
• [18:56] Jacqueline & cryptographers/Alan Turing story
• [19:31] Mitchell shares POW story, silence of veterans for decades
• [22:20] Graff discusses PTSD and reticence
• [24:34] Ginger discusses Black units and their postwar experience
• [27:11] Graff details Black soldiers in Britain and D-Day
• [34:12] Flora shares liberation as a hidden Jewish child
• [38:45] Chris shares father’s West Point story
• [40:13] Alan on air reconnaissance, B17 ditching, and Los Alamos
• [42:00] Ann shares her father’s Omaha Beach story and postwar silence
• [44:04] Graff discusses memorializing the dead in his book
• [47:07] Quote: Buddy Mazara on being glad to have been there
• [48:19] Graff’s final reflection on keeping these stories alive

Closing Thoughts

This episode is a moving testament to the living memory of D-Day. Listeners' stories, both tragic and triumphant, personal and historic, are woven together by Garrett M. Graff's deep historical knowledge and commitment to oral history. The episode not only honors those who fought and died but serves as a reminder of the importance of preserving first-person voices—to keep the complexity of history alive as we transition from memory into history.