Military History of a positive note.

    One of the things that reading teaches me is how little I actually know.  It seems every book I pick up is filled with information that is news to me. ECV sent me a book of military history filled with "well I didn't know that" moments. OPERATION CHOWHOUND: The Most Risky, Most Glorious US Bomber Mission of WW II, by Stephen Dando-Collins is about the air lift of food to Nazi occupied Holland in the winter of 44-45.  In the final days of the War Germany cut food rations to the Dutch so starvation was rampant. Britain and the US used Lancaster and B-17 Bombers to drop food from less than 400 feet. To do this they had to fly over active, armed German troops who could have shot them down. "More than 25,000 men from the 8th Air Force's 3rd Air Division, both air and ground crews, were involved in 'Operation Chowhound', which saw the division's B-17s fly 2,268 Chowhound sorties." P. 221. This rescued 1000s from starvation and was a model for the Berlin Air Lift later, when East Germany isolated West Berlin.
    Dando-Collins writes well and the book appears to be well researched. It contains many interviews and first person reports. While the thrust of the book is the food drop he does a good of elucidating the historical context and also follows up with stories about many of the characters after the war. 
   Yes, I recommend it.

Takk for alt,

Al

I leave you with a bit of poetry.


Housekeeping
We mourn the broken things, chair legs
wrenched from their seats, chipped plates,
the threadbare clothes. We work the magic
of glue, drive the nails, mend the holes.
We save what we can, melt small pieces
of soap, gather fallen pecans, keep neck bones
for soup. Beating rugs against the house,
we watch dust, lit like stars, spreading
across the yard. Late afternoon, we draw
the blinds to cool the rooms, drive the bugs
out. My mother irons, singing, lost in reverie.
I mark the pages of a mail-order catalog,
listen for passing cars. All day we watch
for the mail, some news from a distant place.
From “Domestic Work,” by Natasha Trethewey (Graywolf Press, 2000