My brother said that one day towards the end of a spring semester, an
older prof told the class to put down their pencils...and spent the next hour
telling them about his “free Grand Tour of Europe” from Normandy to Germany.
My brother, in his late 20s was probably the oldest student.
He said the younguns looked like they had been hit with a stick after the
hour was over.
I experienced something like that from a history professor, even though the course material was supposed to cover medieval Europe. I think a large number of men became educators after seeing so much death. Many years later, they set aside time to tell those stories - even though so many of them are usually tight-lipped about their experiences.
My fifth-grade teacher was also a WWII vet who served in the Navy. I knew he was former military before he said anything about it - the ramrod-straight posture is a sure giveaway. I used to smile at his occasional reference to the "Nipponese". Long after I moved on to high school, he was named the state's poet laureate. A few of his poems offer glimpses into what the Pacific was like, 1941-45.
We are losing those men and women so rapidly now... God bless every last one of them.