News : VSHS teacher, student share inspiring lessons they learned at Normandy

Riley Ries pays tribute to an Iowa soldier who died in France during WWII.

Normandy Institute: Riley Ries and Mrs. Kelly Steffen visited the famous WWII site last month.

More photos from the Normandy Institute trip...

WE REMEMBER: Normandy Institute students leave a message in the sand in France.

Almost every summer, Kelly Steffen would to go to a history teachers’ workshop and see for herself some unique, important places and monuments.

At every one of these places Mrs. Steffen would say, “I wish my students could see this.”

This summer, thanks to the generosity of a World War II veteran, Mrs. Steffen and several other teachers from across the U.S. had a chance to let one of their students see one of the world’s best known historic place: Normandy, the French province where Allied troops landed on D-Day.

When Mrs. Steffen learned about the Albert Small Normandy Institute, she knew immediately which Vinton-Shellburg High School to invite: Riley Ries. Riley, soon to be a junior, has already decided he wants to be a history teacher. Riley, said Mrs. Steffen before the trip to France last month, is “like a sponge” when it comes to soaking in the lessons of history.

After a few days in Washington, D.C., the group of teachers and students from all over the U.S. flew to France, and rode a bus to the beaches where U.S. and other allied troops landed on June 6, 1944.

They stood in the water of the English Channel, feeling the wind and the force of the tide as they looked up at the cliffs that the Germans had fortified with countless machine guns and artillery. They walked up those cliffs and stood where the German soldiers had waited for the invaders. The gathered at a cemetery and read tearful eulogies to soldiers from their states who died in France in 1944. They visited villages where grateful citizens still fly U.S. flags in tribute to the soldiers who liberated them from the Nazis 69 years ago.

“The trip accomplished everything that Albert Small hoped it would do,” said Mrs. Steffen, as she and Riley planned presentations for this week’s meetings of the Vinton Lions and Kiwanis clubs.

While the teacher said her favorite place to visit on the trip was Omaha Beach, the main D-Day landing area, she said her favorite part of the trip was observing the students absorb the history and its significance.

“It was unique to see it through their eyes,” says the teacher.

Riley agrees, saying that learning with other students was a highlight for him as well.

One of the main lessons of the trip, said Riley, is how important and how difficult the invasion of Normandy was for U.S. troops. World history would have been much different if that invasion had failed.

“When you look at the cliffs, you see the degree of impossibility of the Normandy invasion,” he said.

Allied forces suffered more than 10,000 casualties that day; the most recent tallies count 2,500 American D-Day deaths.

The trip also offered some new lessons on the history of war. The participants learned saw the monument in honor of paratrooper John Steele, whose parachute caught on the roof of a church in St. Mere-Eglise, the first village to be liberated by the Allied forces. Steele was captured by Germans, but later escaped. To this day, the people of that village maintain a monument that includes an effigy of a soldier and his parachute caught on the church roof.

Participants also saw the bright red poppies – made famous in the “Flanders’ Field” poem following World War I. And they learned about the “Crickets,” the small noise-making devices paratroopers used to signal to each other after landing in France.

This was the third of at least four Normandy Institute visits sponsored by Small. Mrs. Steffen said he and others have created a very well-organized event that maximizes the learning opportunities for all involved.

In addition to sharing information with the service clubs, Mrs. Steffen and Riley plan to speak to veterans’ groups and also to discuss the trip during the annual Veterans Day assembly, where all V-S students gather.

See a story about their preparation for the trip HERE.

Below is the eulogy Riley prepared and read at the cemetery where thousands of allied soldiers who died in Normandy remain buried:

Eulogy: Harold John Ward

by Riley Ries

I am sad to say that I never had the pleasure of meeting Harold John Ward. Harold was a patriot, a soldier, a son, and a brother. Staff Sergeant Harold Ward gave his life to the great country that is the United States of America so that its people may forever enjoy the three unalienable rights stated in its constitution: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

When his country was attacked Harold enlisted in its military so that he could defend its people and its constitution. When he enlisted he did so with the ever looming possibility that he could die in this great war, but he did so anyway. As a soldier of the greatest military on the planet Staff Sergeant Ward fought bravely and with more concern for the well being of his country than for himself. When Staff Sergeant Ward invaded heavily defended German occupied France he did not back down, he fought for not solely for his own life but also those of his brothers-in-arms.

Then, on that fateful day of June 28, 1944, Staff Sergeant Harold Ward was killed fighting on the defensive line near the village of Montebourg, halfway up the peninsula between Carentan and Cherbourg, most likely by an artillery round fired from the fortress port of Cherbourg. Harold left behind a father, mother, two brothers, and a sister in his hometown of Cedar Falls, Iowa.

Staff Sergeant Ward has proven to me that true heros do not have super powers and dress in fancy costumes to fight villains, but ordinary men and women who put their lives on the line everyday to protect ordinary people like you and me.

Harold: there is no way for anyone in the world to thank you for the selfless sacrifice that you made for your country and your world, I only hope that I can help people to remember you and your fellow soldiers.