Episodes
Wednesday Oct 25, 2023
Episode 58: Every Hero Has a Story
Wednesday Oct 25, 2023
Wednesday Oct 25, 2023
Honor Flight Chicago has now flown over 10,600 senior war veterans to Washington, D.C., to celebrate their service and give them the proper Welcome Home they never received. That number is big -- possibly impenetrable -- but each one of those heroes has a story. Join Paul Meincke on September's HFC111 as he learns the stories of eight different heroes and the impact their HFC experience has had on them.
Friday Sep 29, 2023
Episode 57: David Mann, Vietnam War Gold Star Son
Friday Sep 29, 2023
Friday Sep 29, 2023
David Mann's father was in Vietnam for only a short time when he was killed in a rocket attack months before his namesake son would be born stateside. The younger Mann has spent his life getting to know his dad, recently becoming involved with a group of Gold Star children called Sons and Daughters in Touch. David flew with us on HFC111 to honor his father's legacy and brethren, and share his own experience in this powerful episode.
Wednesday Sep 13, 2023
Episode 56: Norm Bowens, Mike Masello and the Brotherhood of Vietnam Veterans
Wednesday Sep 13, 2023
Wednesday Sep 13, 2023
Norm Bowens and Mike Masello served in Vietnam at different times and at different places. Still, they each brought something home so common to veterans who served in combat: PTSD. Many years later, a chance encounter around a specific chair at a group meeting led the two to become fast friends and brothers. Both flew together on Honor Flight Chicago's 109th mission to Washington, D.C., in July of 2023. Here they share their individual stories of service and their shared journey on the long road of healing.
Tuesday Sep 05, 2023
Episode 55: Vietnam Veteran Jim Parker’s Unique MOS as the ”Bug Man”
Tuesday Sep 05, 2023
Tuesday Sep 05, 2023
Jim Parker grew up an Air Force brat. When the time came for him to join the service during the Vietnam War, he chose the same branch as his father. Despite being raised to know all things Air Force, his assigned role in the war was not one he had ever heard of. While his comrades in arms fought VC and NVA, Jim's adversaries were much smaller and more pervasive: mosquitoes.
Tuesday Aug 08, 2023
Episode 54: Vietnam Veteran Dante Plata and the Power of Music
Tuesday Aug 08, 2023
Tuesday Aug 08, 2023
Dante Plata grew up in the church and fell in love with music and the guitar at an early age. Later, after entering the Army, he spent two years as a corpsman in a hospital in Japan treating the wounded of the Vietnam War. Seeing the results of the horrors of war up close led Dante to turn to his music for healing -- both for himself and for the benefit of those he cared for.
Thursday Jul 20, 2023
Episode 53: WWII Aviator Howard Cain and the Aftermath of Little Boy
Thursday Jul 20, 2023
Thursday Jul 20, 2023
The son of Jewish immigrants from Russia, Howard Cain was so eager to serve in WWII that he forged his parents' signatures to enlist at 17 toward the end of the war. Later, as a flight engineer on a B-29 Superfortress following Japan's surrender, Cain was aboard a reconnaissance flight over the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. What he saw has stuck with him to this day.
Friday Jun 30, 2023
Friday Jun 30, 2023
Honor Flight Chicago flew its 10,000th senior war hero to Washington D.C., on May 10, 2023. On that flight was Vietnam Veteran and Purple Heart recipient Raymond Szweda. Each of the 10,000 veterans we have honored has an individual story of service and sacrifice. Learn Ray's as you follow him throughout his much deserved Day of Honor during which he "learned that it's ok to ask for help."
Friday Jun 16, 2023
Episode 51: Vietnam War Sniper Ronald Baltierra
Friday Jun 16, 2023
Friday Jun 16, 2023
Ronald Baltierra served as a sniper in Vietnam, an assignment so difficult mentally that he failed to pull the trigger the first time he was ordered to do so. He eventually came to understand that as hard as it was to knowingly take a life, he was saving countless more in that brutal war with his actions.
Monday May 22, 2023
Episode 50: Bob Bruzek and the Seabees in Vietnam
Monday May 22, 2023
Monday May 22, 2023
Navy Seabee Bob Bruzek traveled with Honor Flight Chicago in June of 2019 aboard our very first flight to include Vietnam veterans. Flying with him on a laminated card inserted into his hat were the names of two men, friends from Vietnam who did not make it home from the war. As we honored Bob that day, he continued to honor his fallen comrades-in-arms as he has done for the last half century.
Thursday Apr 20, 2023
Episode 49: Celebrating 100 With Rev. Hank Roberson
Thursday Apr 20, 2023
Thursday Apr 20, 2023
Featured in Episode 6 of our podcast, WWII Veteran Hank Roberson is back to celebrate his 100th Birthday! In this short episode, Paul Meincke joins Rev. Roberson at his West Side church on Easter Sunday as the community comes together to honor this hero. Listen in!