Stories of World War II Author:Ann Parr, Editor Jeanne Ahlers, a six-year-old at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, December 7, 1941 when Japan surprise-attacked the US Navy, shows the bullet aimed at her mother as she bid goodbye to her military husband. Nearly four years later in Manila, Don Ferguson copied the message from the Japanese agreeing to the unconditional surrender demaded by the Americans an... more »d other Allied Forces. Glen Funk followed orders June 6, 1944 (D-Day) to bomb oil fields in Romania when the B-24 he piloted was shot down. He and his crew members were held prisoner for more than two months. Mary Holmquist left her one-room school teaching job to train and work at Cessna aircraft in Wichita, Kansas, before transferring to Curtiss-Wright in Columbus, Ohio. Warren Webster traveled merchant marine ships as a Navy man, guarding and delivering ammunition to points around the world. Alice Nelson began her Army nursing career at Camp Carson, Colorado, caring for casualties from the Battle of the Bulge, nearly all of whom were amputees. Emory Frost helped rebuild Germany after the War's devastation left it in shabbles. In all, twenty senior citizens from McPherson County, Kansas, wrote books about their experiences during World War II. Some are veterans, some were factory workers, some described the home-front. Middle school students provided computer support for this one-of-a-kind project about US 1940s history. Meeting weekly from January, 2011 through April, the group combed attics and dresser drawers and the internet for photographs and newspaper articles. Middle schoolers scanned images and formatted text until the books were complete for the publisher. Twenty individual hardbound books took center stage for a standing-room-only reception audience in May. Requests to buy books prompted project coordinator Ann Parr and tech director Marla Elmquist to publish all twenty stories in one volume, Stories of World War II. Readers interested in World War II history, librarians, and museums and heritage centers endorse the book. Bob Dole adds his support to this group's efforts by saying, I believe future generations will learn from your work. Pairing veterans' historical accounts with students' natural curiostiy is a wonderful concept--fostering a learning experience for everyone involved.« less