I've had the pleasure and honor to meet many of these heroes...
For soldiers caught in the cross hairs of World War II, the fight for life was a constant battle. There was little time for proper burials and mourning the dead.
Henry Ficken, now an 80-year-old Modesto man, saw this grim reality of war play out countless times on the island of Iwo Jima.
"When you get 1,000 or so a day dying, there was only so much that could be done," Ficken said. "We had more than 2,500 die in one day on the island. During the war, you didn't have time to do anything with the bodies after they had been killed.
"A lot of times, they were put into shallow graves. A lot of them laid around for days in that hot sun. Unless there was access to a ship that could hold the bodies, they'd have to stay where they were. It was a bad situation, but there wasn't much anyone could do."
In 1946, the year after the war ended, thousands of bodies of men killed in battles overseas were dug from shallow graves and shipped to their hometowns. In Modesto, the flag-covered coffins arrived by train at the depot on Ninth Street. And the family members of dead soldiers weren't the only ones on hand to pay their respects.
A group of war veterans got together and formed a committee to honor and show appreciation to those killed in battle.
That was how the Modesto-area Veterans Funeral Detail came into being.
"Every day when the train came in, these men would go down there together and just be present," Ficken said.
"They figured they'd meet the bodies coming back and show their appreciation. These men just decided they needed to do something."
The Modesto Veterans Funeral Detail, from left to right, Cleo Luke, 73, Modesto; Frank Machado, 79, Modesto; Manuel Baioa, 54, Salida; William Pickel, 72, Modesto; Bob Dietrich, 74, Modesto; Thomas Kelly, 83 Modesto; Warren Brumley, 68, Empire; and Henry Ficken, 80, Modesto. DEBBIE NODA/THE BEE
