Moved to durham north carolina because of fears of an attack on the west coast. good morning. My name is nancy lieb. I'm delighted to welcome you to the 11th annual savannah book festival presented by georgia power, and nancy cintron, family and mark and pat sue in. Many thanks to jack and mary, our sponsors for this glorious menu, the trinity united methodist church.:: ors who have made and continue to make saturday's free festival events possible.

Buy a cheap copy of Fields of Battle: Pearl Harbor, the Rose. Book by Brian Curtis. Free shipping over $10.

90% of our venue, of our revenue comes from donors just like you. We are very excited to we are very excited to havee a savannah book festival app for your phone available this year. It's very easy to get it from. The app store and there are directions in your programs.

Please try to download it. It will help you today. Before we get started i had a couple housekeeping notices.

Immediately following this presentation, brian curtis will be signing festival purchased copies off his books right acros the way. If you are planning to stay for the next author presentation, please move forward to seats in the front so that we can actually count how many spaces are available for the next group. Please take this moment to turn off your cellen phone, and no flash photography is allowed. For the question-and-answer portion please raise your hand. I will call on you and the ushers will come and bring a microphone to you. In the interest of time and to be fair to the other attendees please limit yourself to just one question and please don't tell a story. Brian curtis is with us today.

Courtesy of dill sickles and chris aitken, and bow and chris anders who are with us. Brian curtis a 'new york times' best-selling author of several books and has contributed to sports illustrated. Curtis has served as a national report for cbs college sports and was nominated for two local enemies for his work as a reporter for fox sports network. Please give him a warm welcome. applause thank you, nancy. Good morning.

I love savannah. You have great restaurants. Every day is a beautiful weather like this. laughing can i just see. How many of you live in the landings? It's all a part about is how phenomenal it is.

I'm truly honored to be here in. Savannah to talk about one of the most impactful books for me that a done out of my eight.

I want to carry a quick story about rings. I don't wear a class ring. Went to c the university of virginia.

Some men wear jewelry. I was researching this book and i heard about rings, rings that are given togs participants who play in the rose bowl. And in particular in 1942 rose bowl that i wrote about, players and young men from duke and oregon state were all given a rose bowl ring, signifying that they participated in the historic game. I didn't think much of it in my research entail i had a military researcher work to give me the military files of a lot of these men out off the use archives in st.

As i reconstruct their lives and, unfortunately, their deaths. And again this ring kept coming up in my research as i was crafting this story.

I got a call about two or three weeks after meeting with mr. Halverson, and he said i forget to tell you a story. Sure, i'm all about stories. Everyone has got all story. He said i met with you a few weeks ago in the lobby of the marriott hotel in downtown portland and i was telling you how my father, blessed be his memory, was born - excuse me, was buried with w his rose bowl ring on. I said, yeah, you told me that story.

He said, i've got to tell you something. You got me thinking about the 1942 rose bowl and i wanted to go online and by some member billy for my and my grandkids. So my children and i went online and we started googling and went on ebay and there was a rose bowl ring for sale. And it just warmed my heart as he telling mear the story that meant so much to them that he wanted to buy this ring. But then he said, you know, we.

Looked at the rink more closely and it was dad ring. And the said i don't understand. He said,ea many years ago it d been a robbery at my parents house and unbeknownst to me one of the items taken was his rose bowl ring. So while i i believe this whole time he beenhi buried with the ring on, in actuality someone had stolen the rain and now with selling it for thousands of dollars onar ebay. He and his family called up enough money.

They've gone to the authorities and the authorities either said the statute of limitations are gone, center. They gather together money and bought his father's ring his fk and now it is back in their family possession.

This theme of rings kept coming up in my researcher for this book. We'll start out as an article for sports illustrated in the summer of 2013 ended up being 'fields of battle.' I thought this was a sports book but it didn't turn out that way. And i thought it was a military and were book, but it really didn't turn out that way either. It really is a story of a young group of men and what sacrifice means and what service means, and what happens when you come home from war. So i was struggling to find my next book topic about four or five years ago.

I had gone about a year since i did my last book. I was reading a newsletter that the rose bowl put out and there was a little did you know fact section, and it saidw did you know the only rose bowl game never to be played in pasadena was played in durham north carolina in 1942?

As a former sports report and sports offer i was shocked i've never come across that little known fact. So i did what historians and researchers have done for centuries, and it went to google - inlaughing. And i typed in 19422 rose bowl. There wasn't a tremendous amount of research done on it but what few articles i read, i was fascinated i how i have this granddaddy of them alldd game hd gotten transplanted from pasadena over to the room north carolina. And that's what started to pique my interest in the story here what i did know at the time that her book the sports illustrated story and certainly i didn't know even drink all my research is that of the 80 men who coached or participate in the game, only one is still with us today.ay if i written this book 34 years ago it probably would've been a completely different book.

I literally had to reconstruct a story of men's lives without the men there. Without much firsthand or secondhand source knowledge. One of the gratifying things for me infy this party research process was just trying to find a family member. I would be online sluicing. Reading an obituary and try and find the name of the son or daughter and i would finally tracked him down after two or three months. I would introduce myself on the phone and say, mrs. Parker, my name is brian curtis.

I'm writing this book. I'd love to talk to you about your dad in world war ii and the rose bowl. Most of them would get emotional immediately and say, brian, we would love to tell you the story but we don't know it.

Because dad never talked about work and dad never talked about the rose bowl. We knew he played in a rose bowl but we don't know much. And so as excited as i would do to track down these family members it was equally disappointing to understand that they could not be helpful to me. So i would get on a plane and go to oregon in the small towns of jefferson and albany and hood river and salem and outskirts of portland, and try to collect as much information that i could from long-lost cousins or from local libraries or the archives. At oregon state, and similarly doing the same d thing at duke university where i found personal letters were written home from the war front that literally probably have not been touched since they would donate to the archives.

Part of this project was piecing together military files, academic transcripts, what little newspaper stories there were about this game in 1942-1944 and then coming up 44 and then coming up with the narrative. One of the blessings for me in doing this project is that i've been able to educate the families about their dad and a grandparent.

I can telli them when he went to high school. I can tell them what classes they took in college. A lot of them got d's and f's. laughing and i was not shy about passing that information on as well. Just so although stories about how they worked hard, listen, your dad was not as smart as you thought. laughing but but i was also able for manf them to get a hold of their full military file so we knew when he.

Enlisted and what datese they serve and what ship they shipped out on. Again it was beauty for me because he was i didn't use 80 or 90% of the information to research, i was able to pass it on to the families and give them a little bit closer to mom and dad. So really this wass about building a story about a group of men who played in this now remarkable game and ended up went to dances in.

What really hooked me on is as i did research to discover the story of charles haynes and frank parker. Charles haynes played for duke university, grew up a couple blocks from campus, wasou an all-american wrestler in the a y scout and everybody knew him.

He enrolled at duke. He didn't play much on the football team. But he suited up for coach wallace wade. Shortly after that game haynes found himself in the army. Yet tried to list a couple times earlier in the air force his.

Eyesight had prevent him from becoming a pilot. So he in sept flash forward to use them again in 1944 and he is fighting in the hills of italy against the germans. Well, it just so happens that about a month before october 1944, a few months before, july, he is at an encampment while they were on the front lines and he's talking a gentleman named parker. Frank parker happened to play in that same rose bowl game but for the other side, oregonow state. So here they are two years later not really knowing each other but having a connection of playing in the granddaddy of them all, so to speak. They both arere leaders in their postings and one of their jobs was to be the first up the hill.

So imagine charging of a heel knowing the enemy is on the other side. You are the first leading dozens if not hundreds of men charging up a randomly numbered fields in.

Charles haynes one day in october 4, 1944 charges of the hill, and as he makes progress, there is no bullets coming his way. There's no bombs.

He can't believe it. He keeps going further and further. He hits the apex of the hill when the germans opened fire. They rip open holes in his legs.

He gets shot in the chest and a wound about the size of a softball is inn his chest. Bullets are flying. His fellow soldiers can't get to them to picko it up off the battlefield.

So aso haynes is laying there, bleeding out to death. He says prayers for his mom. He thinks about his parents back home in durham. He says his goodbyes and closes his eyes. Then it starts to snow.

An hour goes by, two hours, five hours, seven hours. 17 hours he lay dying in the snow and mud on this hill in italy. Until someone grabs his arm.al charles, charles, wake up. Charles opens up his eyes.

He is still alive, and who does he see but he sees frank parker. Frank parker, the man who played against him on the football field two years earlier with help from another soldier takes up charles is bloody body, kerry sent down the hill under gunfire, gets intoo medical ten. He is transferred to hospital in naples and charles haynes makes a full recovery.

Frank parker, after taking him to the medical tent, turned around immediately and went back the veil and saved the lives over the next 24 hours. Charles haynes just - gets released to imagine almost dying on the heel and a few months later he is back on the front lines because we needed bodies. As americans in our work. Frank parker andnd charles hayns creative friendship.

They say goodbye in may of 1945 in the austrian alps. They stay in touch a little bit when they get back in the state but never laid eyes on each other. Until approximately 1991. It was celebrating the 50th 50th anniversary of that rose t bowl game, and the folks at oregon state wanted to recognize their only rose bowl champion.

So they hosted a banquet for whoever was still remaining and able to attend. He also invited any of their opponents who had played against them at duke. And there were just a handful of duke players that came. One of them was charles haynes. And charles haynes said, i know we at duke a good host our own reunion in a month, but i can't wait to see the man who saved my life. I need to seeee if you still alive. And charles haynese.

Traveled fm durham out to oregon, and as i write about in the introduction of the book,k, sure enough, he starts weeping as you looks across the room and sees the man. Who saved his life. Four weeks later,hehe frank parr and his wife travel to durham and the same kind of reunion takes place. And until the death, admin stayed in touch.

Charles haynes went through a couple of marriages, and his last partner, girlfriend, mailed me last year o mean many of hit possessions, including some of the gifts that frank parker had given to charles haynes. I wrote about these two men in this book because here are two guys, one dirt poor from corvallis oregon what you would lost his father at the age of 11 or 12 in a car accident. His uncle married his mother. He had to workhe all through hih school and college just to make ends meet. And here is charles haynes in durham middle upper class family, father was an executive at american tobacco company.

They both go off to war. They both killed dozens of men. They both get awarded medals for.

The service in action. But they comee home to america c and allies could not have been more different. Charles haynes was a war hero, opened up a restaurant, gregarious, had fun, took spanish and cooking classes at duke university, was friends with mike krzyzewski, was known for walking around the room in full duke regalia.

Open a construction company, was very successful, had a couple of wise as i mentioned. Frank parker moves back to oregon, but stayed in italy an extra year after the war. He couldn't go home to face his lifetime sweetheart and wife. He thought he had fundamentally changed as a man because of the horrors that he saw and the crimes in his eyes that he had committed. So he delayed returning home. He suffered from alcoholism most of his life. He became a fisherman.

Never went back to complete his. College education. He lived his life on the sea, almost died a few times. After his wifee passed away from an aneurysm, considered suicide multiple times. Finally, one of his eldest daughters content to a va hospital in kodiak, alaska, and in portland,n oregon, where for the first time after 50, 60 years he started to open up and talk about some of the demons of war. Some of the other players from the game came home, suffered from drug abuse ander alcoholis.

Tom committed suicide. We talk about the greatest generation, and in my eyes they all are, but we think about tickertape parades and homecomings.

And these men who were billy boys sent to islands in places far away struggled with this the rest of their lives. And part of 'fields of battle' the book in narrative, what started as this sports book about how the rose bowl went from one city o to another. Candidate being a story about these boys going to war. But my own curiosity kept it from ending a war. Because i said to myself, what happened to these guys when they got home?

Did they become teachers? Did war impact them? Did i football remain a piece of their life? I'm a former sports broadcaster and for thosead of you who follw sports, you often hear broadcasters use war metaphors when talking about sports. It's the battle of the century. They left it all out on the battlefield. These are soldiers, and my men need toer hit hard.

After doing this book i i reald how silly that is. Because war is nothing like football. What i learned is that these boys, as t eager as some of them were too signed up at 19, 20, 21 years old thought that war was a game. They thought the war would g be just like football because their. Coaches would say, man, go over there and fight hard and be strong and hit hard.

All it took was about an hour in battle for these young boys to realize that war is nothing in common with football. Now, as a side note some of the lessons of these boys learned on the football field did certainly help them in war, overcoming adversity, getting knocked out and getting right back on your feet.

The toughgh get going, when toughness faces then. And there are countless stories not only with these players but of the athletes who have fought in war, talking about how the lessons they learned on the sports field kept him alive. So it's a triumphant story in ways. We won the war for those of you who don't know.

Those of you in savannah, i hate to say at it but the north acty won the civil war as well. The parts of the story that were. Great often overshadowed the sadness of not just the deaths, the suicides, the alcoholism, but stories like jackie who was two years old when he came over to america from japan with his mom. They settled in portland. He was raised in a public school in portland living a life in a small japanese community in downtown portland going to public school, with a great athlete.

Picked up the game of football, was a great basketball player, matriculated to oregon state and made the football team under coach lon stiner. Everybody loved jackie. The only thing that set jack apart was his japanese last name and where he was born. But for all intents and purposes jack was an american.

And so he we played sparingly throughout the 1942 season for the oregon state game, and everything was going well until december 7, 1941. Pearl harbor gets bombed and immediately any want of japanese.

Ancestry was looked upon with suspect, certainly on the west coast. Sweat the time they were about 42, 44 japanese ancestry students enrolled in oregon state. Some of j the landlords kicked them out of their apartments for dorms. They were spent on.

They were called names. Many of them immediately withdrew from school to go back home. Remember that the federal government began to very quickly in turn many japanese americans so they went home to sell the possessions. But jack wasas a college studen. Jack was a football player at the pacific coast conference champions. He was headed to the rose bowl.

A couple days go by and people gave jack dirty looks but all is well. Oregon state is practicing deep and ready to get on the train on december 19 to take it across the country to durham. A few days before on a rainy day to menai in suits and trenchcoas up on the practice field at oregon state, and they go over to coach lon stiner and he. Whispered to him, and coach stiner says jack, jack, come here. E.jack jogs over, good student, good player,nt listens to his coach. And jack introduced him to these two men who promptly told him they were with the fbi, escorted him off the field, told him that he was not allowed to go with this team to play in the rose bowl game. Flash forward a few days later at the train station in portland, and they had a great farewell of people from all over portland.

You've got to understand the magnitude of oregon state in 1942 playing in the rose bowl game. This legitimized the university. This made the entire state proud proud. And who was there onpr the train platform but jack, crime, waving as his team went the way on this train trip. Jack wouldld go back home in portland.

He would listen to the rose bowl game on a small radio in his. Parents home. Within months his parents were forced to close down the restaurant. Jack was forced to sell all his possessions including a car. They were sent to what was an animal livestock holding area in portland, him and his family. A few months later sent to an internment camp in the desert really of idaho where jack would spend his time. Jack passed away not before oregon state recognized him and other japanese-americans that were basically expelled from schooll and never completed.

They were awarded honorary degrees. He was given his rose bowl ring. I i was able to track down his daughter who lives in the northwest, and so much, still resentment and anger in the family, for how they had been treated.

Eight was fascinating to get to know the family. I did my research. I promised that i would treat.

Her and her fathers legacy the right way because i really believe that. So the family opened up a bit to me. But flash forward to september of 2016, and oregon state recognize the 75th anniversary team.

I hope help the university contact all these families to come back. Now i remember i toldk. You that everyone is deceased on that game working except for one, a duke player in louisville. But the sonsr and daughters came back, many forir the first time, to oregonte state. Jack's daughter, grandkids and great grandkids came back. It was probably one of the more emotional and memorable nights of my life to see the embrace between the descendents of these former players and the common bond that all of them had shared together. At at duke they honored that team about a week later.

Of course oregon state won the game so they were much more enthralled and ages to honor the team. Jim smith is 96. He lives in louisville, kentucky, about sims asn you wil ever meet. He iss a widower, mind as sharp as a tack. I defended ginger i now call him and his family good friends. Jim went back to duke with me in september 2016.

We had the chance to talk to the duke football team,o to go out o practice, and the honored him on the few before the game. Or excuse me, at halftime of e game. But every dayay that went on, nt just in my research but after the publication of the book, the book took on new meaning for me. How many of you in this audience served your country in some capacity? applause probably many of you have a relative who served, whether afghanistan or iraq or korea or vietnam or world war ii or world war i, thank you. Because family sacrifice as i learn. One of the greatest appreciations i got from thisot book is the respect i have for the men and women who serve our country.

Because what they see and what they go through is dramatically changes their lives. And so this book has made a difference for me in my life in lmy appreciation and in speakig to groups, seeing the eyes and faces of men mainly, but women as well. Because as i'm talking about what these world war ii guys went through, the veterans of vietnam and korea start to tear up, or from iraq and afghanistan, because they can kind of understand where they came from. Four gentleman lost their lives to its late in the game. And something else that hit me is their lives were stop so young. One of the gentlemen was bob. Vanni who is skilled in iwo jima and remember doing the research underway to go find if his wife was still alive.

I went tove see if his kids were still living. But, of course, he was killed when he was just 18 or 19.

There was no wife. There are no legacy children. I found a third or fourth cousin somewhere in pennsylvania who may be had heard about a guy named bob, but for all intents and purposes it's almost like this gentleman didn't exist. And that was true with some of these other men, and i've made it a point now to make my contributions to places in their memory, if only that someone continues to recognize. That's just four added 80 of 80.

Imagine the tens of thousands of mantua sacrificed their lives in all of our wars who did not leave behind a spouse or children or grandchildren. I think we always need to keep them in mind. That parallel stories that i write about in 'fields of battle' is this climactic rose bowl game and war, but at the same time these teams are playing for a football game.

Fdr and churchill are in d.c. Planning for war. And in these little nuggets that i would pull out of my research, the oregon state team gets on the train, and as i write about in the book of its cut air-conditioning, menus, beautiful white linens and silverware, things that these young boys had never seen before. Andd they stop in all the small towns and they got off in chicago to static fields to practice and stretch their legs.

Well, it turns out as i was doing my research the origins of the manhattan project, those scientists that were working in the early stages of all the scientific things that produced the bomb, were working in an undisclosed lab about 200 yards or more the oregon state football team was practicing in. And then when they suit up for the game, both teams, in a game that oregon state wongo on janul in the white house at one of the early conferences of thehe were deciding where she was in our allied troops first.

Where are we going to attack?.f following this sports journey but also our journey to a war. Another little-known fact that i discovered is that pearl harbor, when it was attacked, actually to college football teams in hawaii at the time of the attack. The players from a university outside of portland, oregon, were there as was the team from san jose state university. They were there to play a round robin of games against the university of hawaii. So they are there having breakfast, these teams get hee to board buses to go toward the island. They start seeing these bombs.

Drop in the water and they are seeing planes overhead. And these boys turned to the waiters and waitresses and the folks working at the hotel and say, what is going on macs don't worry about it. It's just u.s. Navy exercises. So they go back to eating food coming pretty shortly thereafter the smell of oil after hotel six or seven miles away stores to waver then the smell of oil starts to waver in. Japanese bombers are bonded.

Word comes over the radio quickly and those men restricted into the wind he's worse. They were given guns and told to patrol the street. It could be weeks before most of those boys ever return to the united states. A handful never left hawaii. They served in the army or the national guard, got married, had children and never came home. It's the little tidbits i learned along the way that are fascinating for me.

To last stories. Wallace wade was the head coach at duke university, previously won national championships alabama. During this time he decided that my boys were going into service, so was i. This 49-year-old football coach shocked the world when shortly after the rose bowl loss he enlisted, rose in the ranks, went overseas in 1944, participated after normandy, controlled the 242nd artiller artillery, face battle himself, and at one point at the battle of the bulge in the snowy forest on the edge of belgium, he is freezing and he jumps into a foxhole to try to get some coffee. He says to this young private, may i borrow a cup of coffee. He's freezing, the gentleman takes off his coat, get some coffee and food and wade says to the gentleman what's your name. He said where you from?

He said i'm from oregon. He had playedre on the oregon state resulting that had lost, or had one against wallace wade team. They are in a foxhole twohe years later the muller war here is one of these other quinces of these two teams coming together. There are more of those stories that i write about throughout the book. The winning score was an unbelievable catch by little a guy named jean grey. He got the longest rose bowl touchdown pass in history at the time and it won the game.

Four years later those same. Hands and arms i had caught the winning touchdown were now gone.

He fought as a pilot in the war and decided to stay in the army air force and lost both his arms and an awful training accident after the war. This book is meaningful toop me. I hope for those of you get the chance to read it you can take something away about service and sacrifice in about a unique time in our history. Some of the same things, paying players, academics, concussions, all theam same issues 75 or 80 years ago. I hope you enjoy this book as much as i enjoyed the journey and i'm happy to take some questions. if you have a question, your you please raise hand, i will call on you.

The people from cspan would love it if you're feeling comfortable standing when you give us your question. Raise your hand please. being a sportscaster, do you have a favorite player or favorite team that you follow? you know i can't answer that question.

you've got to be a yankee fan. Are you a yankee fan. and i love the yankees. I don't know what to tell you. I'm a fan of the eagles. applause i grew up in wilmington delaware outside philadelphia.

Because of the work i do have backed off my allegiances from pro or college teams. I'm generally a fan of whose ever winning. Other questions. you talk about the decision to cancel the rose bowl? I think a lot of the other bowls were played near their actual site. what's your name.

been price. thank you for that question. When pearl harbor t got bombed, a lot of folks across america wondered if the game was going to go on.

Rose bowl organizers had already set the dig game. Oregon state and duke wanted to play. Some of the men enlisted or went off toca war but we are america. When i can stop just because we got bombed but slowly, day by day there was a backlash for playing the game. 60 people in the stadium in southern california attempting to target the. Japanese bombers. There are still so much insecurity about it.

A week after pearl pearl harbor, generalth dewitt in charge of the west coast for the military telegram to the governor of california and said my request, don't play this game and don't have a parade. The governor at that time abided by their wishes and canceled the game. There were editorials in the observer in the newme york times going back and forth about whether or not we should play this game and when is the right time to restart sports medicine as it was canceled and word spread, chicago raised its hand, the cotton bowl, in nashville, all kinds of cities said why don't you play here. In the end, wallace wade, the head coach of duke was a very powerful coach of the time and said we are in the game, when we hosted here in durham. Very quickly, after the cancellation of the game, it was announceday it would be played in durham, the. Tournament of roses gave it an official sanction so it still counts as an official rose bowl game.

There were still people in north carolina that didn't want the game to be played anbecause they thought they would be a target for german bombers coming over. About it in a book, they wanted to get an aerial shot ofdi the stadium but before they threw flew a plane over they made multiple pa announcements to the crowd to stay look, if you see a plane, it's not the germans, it's actually the good guys trying to take a picture. The great question because it led me too my own thought about 911 which for someone like me is the best i can recollect. A i was too young one vietnam was going on and i wasn't born in korea but i thought about when they played and the closest i can compare to was what i wrote about 75 years. When is the right time to play sports?

Is itri there to get our country back on its feet? Are they there to serve as a necessary distraction or do they take away policing manpower we should be focused on other things other than sports? I don't know the right answer. thank you. Brian, you've written a number of books, could you answer the question, what are your favorite books that you've written, and why?

so i have written eight. I think for me, the two most impactful books because of the difference it made on me, not whether it was a bestseller or not, is probably this book. Because of learning about service and sacrifice in a book a wroted five or six years ago, legacy letters and i was looking for a book to have more meaning. When 911 happened, i was living in los angeles as a sports reporter and always felt guilty that i can do more but i wanted to go to new york, i wanted to help, i wanted to search the rubble at ground zero. All i could do was give blood in los angeles which i did do. Flashforward years later when i was looking for a meaningful book, i wrote about t a camp exist for the children who lost a mom and dad in 911 and i read this article and i said that's my next book. I partnered with an organization called tuesday's children which is still in existence in york which was created to serve the children and the families of 911.

What i did is i decided to see if families would be willing. To write letters to their lost loved one on a ten year anniversary of 911.

The response was overwhelming. I got to know many of the families intimately, as you can imagine there's a lot of emotion, even ten years after so there will be a 14-year-old girl writing a letter to the dad that she lost at such a tender age of the 2-year-old who never knew mom or dad for the widower who still can't get over the loss of her husband and has never gone on a date or move on in life.

That book had a clear impact on me.fe makes you want to hold your kids tighter. It gives you better appreciation for how quickly life can disappear. Of all my books, it would be this world were to book and the 911 legacy letters. brian, you mentioned a number of soldiers and players who went on to live 'after words', but for their sake, because you made a point of saying there were four who are killed who never had a chance to have families or have children, do remember their names? thank you for sharing that.

I can remember three of the top of my head. Bob nanny, everett smith, al hoover, and the fourth will come to me. One was killed on patrol.

One got off his ship in the waters and was shot before he ever reached the shore. Al hoover was a marine and legend had it that he died on. is absolutely better. Avidly we know some of the issues going onri in the va today that some people may argue their worst, butle yes, they came home and there is no such thing as ptsd. It wasum called the scars of war or bombso trauma or things like that. The va did exist but it certainly was not there for mental credit w was there if you have lost a limb to try to teach you how to use a prosthetic.

For me, after the gulf war we started have a different appreciation for soldiers coming home. While our va services are not where they should be, certainly we understand better the mental cost of war than these gentlemen did because remember, imagine seeing someone's head blown off next you. Imagine seeing the horrors of war and the never ever talking about it. Not to your wife, not your kids, not to a therapist and then expecting to come home and get a job or finish school, get married ands live happily. That to me is why so many of these gentlemen are the greatest generation.

Because of what they did indoor and were able to carry on and have successful lives. Women, we overlooked, they played an important role in world war ii as well. Weather was on the homefront or serving as nurses, but certainly in those days, we think of the little woman staying at home, taking care of the kids in the gardener while the man went out and that was true for some women, but a lot of women served here on the courtside, americans women federation, putting together and caring for wounded when they came back, et cetera. yes, ma'am. you speak to a lot of veterans group and have you been asked to speak to the ones that go to washington d.c., flights of freedom. i believe it's called honor.

That's one of the charities i contributed to in honor of these four gentlemen. Honor flights pays for the flights of world war ii veterans to tour the world war ii memorial which, if any of you have ever done, do it. As far as speaking, i will speak to any veterans group.

Characters to veterans in the room or thousand veterans in the room. Peter never turned down an invitation to one of o those wgroups, i've never gone to d.c. To do it, certainly, if anybody wants to invite me, i will come to it because i feel that's part of my pay back to them.

It's the least i can do for their service. any other questions. yes, ma'am.

i can't answer that question and to get a. laughter what's your next book. now i am able to answer the question. I have no idea what my next book is.

I did two that came out in the fall of 16, it took a little time off and frankly i'm kind of struggling. That is not an invitation for any ofa. You to give me an idea. I was joking with bo and chris who have been such gracious host. They asked me what is one m of the most common things. Everyone either wants to know what my next book is or they've got a great story to tell me too write about which probably happens to a lot of authors. I don't know.

I know i'm not going to do it for money, although someone will pay me for it, not going to do it for any other reason then i'm attracted to the story, i'm passionate and it's can make a difference. If i never come across the next 50 years to one of those am i will never read another book, but i only do the right reasons. applause we can have time for one more question. Does anyone have another. haveac you read the book the boys and the vote, and if you have do see the parallels between your book and that book. is a great question.

How many of you have read boys in the vote. How many of you have read fields of battle. You see the problem with having here people. I believe there for sale in the tent. Feel the battle is a tremendous book. The books that laura hildebrand has done unbroken, the genre of historical nonfiction of which this fall then, those books kind of pave the way for publisher and commercial interests in books like this. Taking what is essentially a sports story like rowers in the olympics must a hundred years ago but making it into much more of a cultural story.

And human interest story, in no way am i comparing thei my book to theirs, their books are phenomenal but it all falls in the genre. The publishing world goes in cycles.

A book works so whenever he wants tono write a book a matter genre and maybe a few years this genre may die way and maybe in 20 years it will come back again. It just depends. Obut i'll take one more question. Through them and asked myself the question. And say brian, what is your one take away from writing this book.

Brian, that's a great question. I think the take away is that everybody's life is amazing. To me, whether you fought in war or didn't, whether you've lived a very quiet life here.

In savannah, worked at a company, clocked in for 35 years, raised a good family, your hero to anything too often come in our society, we put s certain folks on pedestals as heroes because of something famous they did for the sacrifices they did, but every day, i was walking over hear from the hotel, looking at people,ut curious about the sacrifices they've made for their own kids or for their marriage or for caring for enell person. For me, while the veterans in war and everything else have become close to my heart, it reaffirmed my belief that everyone has a great story.

Everyone should share that story so even if you think your story is important, make sure you share with someone and share with your kids. Unfortunately, those folks that pass away, when you talk to them right before death, they will often say their biggest regret isn't that i didn't write a book or start a movie or make more money if. They wish i had spent more time with my kids were wish i had told my kids more about my life so i know that my legacy will be carried on. Maybe tonight, bo and chris enders who are so kind as my host and have sponsored, i hope it's okay, they will pay for all your dinners tonight if you go to dinner and share with a loved one your story. Thank you very much. please join me in thanking brian curtis.

As you exit the venue, you will see our wonderful volunteers with yellow buckets to accept your donations to the savannah book festival. It is because of your generosity that we are able to keep the festival free. Please help us to continue. Thank you for coming.

Moved to durham north carolina because of fears of an attack on the west coast. good morning.

My name is nancy lieb. I'm delighted to welcome you to the 11th annual savannah book festival presented by georgia power, and nancy cintron, family and mark and pat sue in. Many thanks to jack and mary, our sponsors for this glorious menu, the trinity united methodist church.:: ors who have made and continue to make saturday's free festival events possible. 90% of our venue, of our revenue comes from donors just like you. We are very excited to we are very excited to havee a savannah book festival app for your phone available this year. It's very easy to get it from.

The app store and there are directions in your programs. Please try to download it. It will help you today. Before we get started i had a couple housekeeping notices. Immediately following this presentation, brian curtis will be signing festival purchased copies off his books right acros the way. If you are planning to stay for the next author presentation, please move forward to seats in the front so that we can actually count how many spaces are available for the next group.

Please take this moment to turn off your cellen phone, and no flash photography is allowed. For the question-and-answer portion please raise your hand. I will call on you and the ushers will come and bring a microphone to you.

In the interest of time and to be fair to the other attendees please limit yourself to just one question and please don't tell a story. Brian curtis is with us today. Courtesy of dill sickles and chris aitken, and bow and chris anders who are with us.

Brian curtis a 'new york times' best-selling author of several books and has contributed to sports illustrated. Curtis has served as a national report for cbs college sports and was nominated for two local enemies for his work as a reporter for fox sports network.

Please give him a warm welcome. applause thank you, nancy. Good morning. I love savannah. You have great restaurants.

Every day is a beautiful weather like this. laughing can i just see. How many of you live in the landings? It's all a part about is how phenomenal it is. I'm truly honored to be here in. Savannah to talk about one of the most impactful books for me that a done out of my eight. I want to carry a quick story about rings.

I don't wear a class ring. Went to c the university of virginia. Some men wear jewelry.

I was researching this book and i heard about rings, rings that are given togs participants who play in the rose bowl. And in particular in 1942 rose bowl that i wrote about, players and young men from duke and oregon state were all given a rose bowl ring, signifying that they participated in the historic game. I didn't think much of it in my research entail i had a military researcher work to give me the military files of a lot of these men out off the use archives in st.

As i reconstruct their lives and, unfortunately, their deaths. And again this ring kept coming up in my research as i was crafting this story. I got a call about two or three weeks after meeting with mr.

Halverson, and he said i forget to tell you a story. Sure, i'm all about stories. Everyone has got all story. He said i met with you a few weeks ago in the lobby of the marriott hotel in downtown portland and i was telling you how my father, blessed be his memory, was born - excuse me, was buried with w his rose bowl ring on.

I said, yeah, you told me that story. He said, i've got to tell you something. You got me thinking about the 1942 rose bowl and i wanted to go online and by some member billy for my and my grandkids. So my children and i went online and we started googling and went on ebay and there was a rose bowl ring for sale. And it just warmed my heart as he telling mear the story that meant so much to them that he wanted to buy this ring. But then he said, you know, we. Looked at the rink more closely and it was dad ring.

And the said i don't understand. He said,ea many years ago it d been a robbery at my parents house and unbeknownst to me one of the items taken was his rose bowl ring. So while i i believe this whole time he beenhi buried with the ring on, in actuality someone had stolen the rain and now with selling it for thousands of dollars onar ebay. He and his family called up enough money. They've gone to the authorities and the authorities either said the statute of limitations are gone, center. They gather together money and bought his father's ring his fk and now it is back in their family possession. This theme of rings kept coming up in my researcher for this book.

We'll start out as an article for sports illustrated in the summer of 2013 ended up being 'fields of battle.' I thought this was a sports book but it didn't turn out that way. And i thought it was a military and were book, but it really didn't turn out that way either. It really is a story of a young group of men and what sacrifice means and what service means, and what happens when you come home from war.

So i was struggling to find my next book topic about four or five years ago. I had gone about a year since i did my last book. I was reading a newsletter that the rose bowl put out and there was a little did you know fact section, and it saidw did you know the only rose bowl game never to be played in pasadena was played in durham north carolina in 1942? As a former sports report and sports offer i was shocked i've never come across that little known fact. So i did what historians and researchers have done for centuries, and it went to google - inlaughing. And i typed in 19422 rose bowl.

There wasn't a tremendous amount of research done on it but what few articles i read, i was fascinated i how i have this granddaddy of them alldd game hd gotten transplanted from pasadena over to the room north carolina. And that's what started to pique my interest in the story here what i did know at the time that her book the sports illustrated story and certainly i didn't know even drink all my research is that of the 80 men who coached or participate in the game, only one is still with us today.ay if i written this book 34 years ago it probably would've been a completely different book.

I literally had to reconstruct a story of men's lives without the men there. Without much firsthand or secondhand source knowledge. One of the gratifying things for me infy this party research process was just trying to find a family member.

I would be online sluicing. Reading an obituary and try and find the name of the son or daughter and i would finally tracked him down after two or three months. I would introduce myself on the phone and say, mrs.

Parker, my name is brian curtis. I'm writing this book.

I'd love to talk to you about your dad in world war ii and the rose bowl. Most of them would get emotional immediately and say, brian, we would love to tell you the story but we don't know it. Because dad never talked about work and dad never talked about the rose bowl. We knew he played in a rose bowl but we don't know much.

And so as excited as i would do to track down these family members it was equally disappointing to understand that they could not be helpful to me. So i would get on a plane and go to oregon in the small towns of jefferson and albany and hood river and salem and outskirts of portland, and try to collect as much information that i could from long-lost cousins or from local libraries or the archives. At oregon state, and similarly doing the same d thing at duke university where i found personal letters were written home from the war front that literally probably have not been touched since they would donate to the archives. Part of this project was piecing together military files, academic transcripts, what little newspaper stories there were about this game in 1942-1944 and then coming up 44 and then coming up with the narrative. One of the blessings for me in doing this project is that i've been able to educate the families about their dad and a grandparent. I can telli them when he went to high school.

I can tell them what classes they took in college. A lot of them got d's and f's. laughing and i was not shy about passing that information on as well. Just so although stories about how they worked hard, listen, your dad was not as smart as you thought.

laughing but but i was also able for manf them to get a hold of their full military file so we knew when he. Enlisted and what datese they serve and what ship they shipped out on. Again it was beauty for me because he was i didn't use 80 or 90% of the information to research, i was able to pass it on to the families and give them a little bit closer to mom and dad. So really this wass about building a story about a group of men who played in this now remarkable game and ended up went to dances in. What really hooked me on is as i did research to discover the story of charles haynes and frank parker. Charles haynes played for duke university, grew up a couple blocks from campus, wasou an all-american wrestler in the a y scout and everybody knew him.

He enrolled at duke. He didn't play much on the football team. But he suited up for coach wallace wade. Shortly after that game haynes found himself in the army. Yet tried to list a couple times earlier in the air force his. Eyesight had prevent him from becoming a pilot.

So he in sept flash forward to use them again in 1944 and he is fighting in the hills of italy against the germans. Well, it just so happens that about a month before october 1944, a few months before, july, he is at an encampment while they were on the front lines and he's talking a gentleman named parker. Frank parker happened to play in that same rose bowl game but for the other side, oregonow state. So here they are two years later not really knowing each other but having a connection of playing in the granddaddy of them all, so to speak. They both arere leaders in their postings and one of their jobs was to be the first up the hill.

So imagine charging of a heel knowing the enemy is on the other side. You are the first leading dozens if not hundreds of men charging up a randomly numbered fields in. Charles haynes one day in october 4, 1944 charges of the hill, and as he makes progress, there is no bullets coming his way. There's no bombs. He can't believe it. He keeps going further and further.

He hits the apex of the hill when the germans opened fire. They rip open holes in his legs. He gets shot in the chest and a wound about the size of a softball is inn his chest. Bullets are flying. His fellow soldiers can't get to them to picko it up off the battlefield. So aso haynes is laying there, bleeding out to death.

He says prayers for his mom. He thinks about his parents back home in durham. He says his goodbyes and closes his eyes. Then it starts to snow. An hour goes by, two hours, five hours, seven hours. 17 hours he lay dying in the snow and mud on this hill in italy.

Until someone grabs his arm.al charles, charles, wake up. Charles opens up his eyes. He is still alive, and who does he see but he sees frank parker. Frank parker, the man who played against him on the football field two years earlier with help from another soldier takes up charles is bloody body, kerry sent down the hill under gunfire, gets intoo medical ten. He is transferred to hospital in naples and charles haynes makes a full recovery. Frank parker, after taking him to the medical tent, turned around immediately and went back the veil and saved the lives over the next 24 hours.

Charles haynes just - gets released to imagine almost dying on the heel and a few months later he is back on the front lines because we needed bodies. As americans in our work. Frank parker andnd charles hayns creative friendship. They say goodbye in may of 1945 in the austrian alps. They stay in touch a little bit when they get back in the state but never laid eyes on each other. Until approximately 1991.

It was celebrating the 50th 50th anniversary of that rose t bowl game, and the folks at oregon state wanted to recognize their only rose bowl champion. So they hosted a banquet for whoever was still remaining and able to attend. He also invited any of their opponents who had played against them at duke. And there were just a handful of duke players that came. One of them was charles haynes. And charles haynes said, i know we at duke a good host our own reunion in a month, but i can't wait to see the man who saved my life.

I need to seeee if you still alive. And charles haynese. Traveled fm durham out to oregon, and as i write about in the introduction of the book,k, sure enough, he starts weeping as you looks across the room and sees the man. Who saved his life. Four weeks later,hehe frank parr and his wife travel to durham and the same kind of reunion takes place. And until the death, admin stayed in touch. Charles haynes went through a couple of marriages, and his last partner, girlfriend, mailed me last year o mean many of hit possessions, including some of the gifts that frank parker had given to charles haynes.

I wrote about these two men in this book because here are two guys, one dirt poor from corvallis oregon what you would lost his father at the age of 11 or 12 in a car accident. His uncle married his mother. He had to workhe all through hih school and college just to make ends meet.

And here is charles haynes in durham middle upper class family, father was an executive at american tobacco company. They both go off to war.

They both killed dozens of men. They both get awarded medals for. The service in action. But they comee home to america c and allies could not have been more different.

Charles haynes was a war hero, opened up a restaurant, gregarious, had fun, took spanish and cooking classes at duke university, was friends with mike krzyzewski, was known for walking around the room in full duke regalia. Open a construction company, was very successful, had a couple of wise as i mentioned. Frank parker moves back to oregon, but stayed in italy an extra year after the war. He couldn't go home to face his lifetime sweetheart and wife. He thought he had fundamentally changed as a man because of the horrors that he saw and the crimes in his eyes that he had committed. So he delayed returning home. He suffered from alcoholism most of his life.

He became a fisherman. Never went back to complete his.

College education. He lived his life on the sea, almost died a few times. After his wifee passed away from an aneurysm, considered suicide multiple times. Finally, one of his eldest daughters content to a va hospital in kodiak, alaska, and in portland,n oregon, where for the first time after 50, 60 years he started to open up and talk about some of the demons of war.

Some of the other players from the game came home, suffered from drug abuse ander alcoholis. Tom committed suicide. We talk about the greatest generation, and in my eyes they all are, but we think about tickertape parades and homecomings. And these men who were billy boys sent to islands in places far away struggled with this the rest of their lives.

And part of 'fields of battle' the book in narrative, what started as this sports book about how the rose bowl went from one city o to another. Candidate being a story about these boys going to war. But my own curiosity kept it from ending a war.

Because i said to myself, what happened to these guys when they got home? Did they become teachers? Did war impact them?

Did i football remain a piece of their life? I'm a former sports broadcaster and for thosead of you who follw sports, you often hear broadcasters use war metaphors when talking about sports. It's the battle of the century. They left it all out on the battlefield. These are soldiers, and my men need toer hit hard. After doing this book i i reald how silly that is. Because war is nothing like football.

What i learned is that these boys, as t eager as some of them were too signed up at 19, 20, 21 years old thought that war was a game. They thought the war would g be just like football because their.

Coaches would say, man, go over there and fight hard and be strong and hit hard. All it took was about an hour in battle for these young boys to realize that war is nothing in common with football.

Now, as a side note some of the lessons of these boys learned on the football field did certainly help them in war, overcoming adversity, getting knocked out and getting right back on your feet. The toughgh get going, when toughness faces then. And there are countless stories not only with these players but of the athletes who have fought in war, talking about how the lessons they learned on the sports field kept him alive. So it's a triumphant story in ways. We won the war for those of you who don't know.

Those of you in savannah, i hate to say at it but the north acty won the civil war as well. The parts of the story that were. Great often overshadowed the sadness of not just the deaths, the suicides, the alcoholism, but stories like jackie who was two years old when he came over to america from japan with his mom. They settled in portland. He was raised in a public school in portland living a life in a small japanese community in downtown portland going to public school, with a great athlete. Picked up the game of football, was a great basketball player, matriculated to oregon state and made the football team under coach lon stiner.

Everybody loved jackie. The only thing that set jack apart was his japanese last name and where he was born.

But for all intents and purposes jack was an american. And so he we played sparingly throughout the 1942 season for the oregon state game, and everything was going well until december 7, 1941. Pearl harbor gets bombed and immediately any want of japanese. Ancestry was looked upon with suspect, certainly on the west coast. Sweat the time they were about 42, 44 japanese ancestry students enrolled in oregon state.

Some of j the landlords kicked them out of their apartments for dorms. They were spent on. They were called names. Many of them immediately withdrew from school to go back home. Remember that the federal government began to very quickly in turn many japanese americans so they went home to sell the possessions. But jack wasas a college studen.

Jack was a football player at the pacific coast conference champions. He was headed to the rose bowl.

A couple days go by and people gave jack dirty looks but all is well. Oregon state is practicing deep and ready to get on the train on december 19 to take it across the country to durham. A few days before on a rainy day to menai in suits and trenchcoas up on the practice field at oregon state, and they go over to coach lon stiner and he. Whispered to him, and coach stiner says jack, jack, come here. E.jack jogs over, good student, good player,nt listens to his coach. And jack introduced him to these two men who promptly told him they were with the fbi, escorted him off the field, told him that he was not allowed to go with this team to play in the rose bowl game.

Flash forward a few days later at the train station in portland, and they had a great farewell of people from all over portland. You've got to understand the magnitude of oregon state in 1942 playing in the rose bowl game. This legitimized the university. This made the entire state proud proud. And who was there onpr the train platform but jack, crime, waving as his team went the way on this train trip.

Jack wouldld go back home in portland. He would listen to the rose bowl game on a small radio in his. Parents home. Within months his parents were forced to close down the restaurant. Jack was forced to sell all his possessions including a car. They were sent to what was an animal livestock holding area in portland, him and his family.

A few months later sent to an internment camp in the desert really of idaho where jack would spend his time. Jack passed away not before oregon state recognized him and other japanese-americans that were basically expelled from schooll and never completed. They were awarded honorary degrees.

He was given his rose bowl ring. I i was able to track down his daughter who lives in the northwest, and so much, still resentment and anger in the family, for how they had been treated. Eight was fascinating to get to know the family. I did my research.

I promised that i would treat. Her and her fathers legacy the right way because i really believe that. So the family opened up a bit to me.

But flash forward to september of 2016, and oregon state recognize the 75th anniversary team. I hope help the university contact all these families to come back. Now i remember i toldk. You that everyone is deceased on that game working except for one, a duke player in louisville. But the sonsr and daughters came back, many forir the first time, to oregonte state. Jack's daughter, grandkids and great grandkids came back. It was probably one of the more emotional and memorable nights of my life to see the embrace between the descendents of these former players and the common bond that all of them had shared together.

At at duke they honored that team about a week later. Of course oregon state won the game so they were much more enthralled and ages to honor the team. Jim smith is 96. He lives in louisville, kentucky, about sims asn you wil ever meet.

He iss a widower, mind as sharp as a tack. I defended ginger i now call him and his family good friends. Jim went back to duke with me in september 2016. We had the chance to talk to the duke football team,o to go out o practice, and the honored him on the few before the game. Or excuse me, at halftime of e game. But every dayay that went on, nt just in my research but after the publication of the book, the book took on new meaning for me.

How many of you in this audience served your country in some capacity? applause probably many of you have a relative who served, whether afghanistan or iraq or korea or vietnam or world war ii or world war i, thank you. Because family sacrifice as i learn. One of the greatest appreciations i got from thisot book is the respect i have for the men and women who serve our country.

Because what they see and what they go through is dramatically changes their lives. And so this book has made a difference for me in my life in lmy appreciation and in speakig to groups, seeing the eyes and faces of men mainly, but women as well. Because as i'm talking about what these world war ii guys went through, the veterans of vietnam and korea start to tear up, or from iraq and afghanistan, because they can kind of understand where they came from. Four gentleman lost their lives to its late in the game. And something else that hit me is their lives were stop so young. One of the gentlemen was bob.

Vanni who is skilled in iwo jima and remember doing the research underway to go find if his wife was still alive. I went tove see if his kids were still living. But, of course, he was killed when he was just 18 or 19.

There was no wife. There are no legacy children. I found a third or fourth cousin somewhere in pennsylvania who may be had heard about a guy named bob, but for all intents and purposes it's almost like this gentleman didn't exist. And that was true with some of these other men, and i've made it a point now to make my contributions to places in their memory, if only that someone continues to recognize. That's just four added 80 of 80.

Imagine the tens of thousands of mantua sacrificed their lives in all of our wars who did not leave behind a spouse or children or grandchildren. I think we always need to keep them in mind. That parallel stories that i write about in 'fields of battle' is this climactic rose bowl game and war, but at the same time these teams are playing for a football game. Fdr and churchill are in d.c. Planning for war.

And in these little nuggets that i would pull out of my research, the oregon state team gets on the train, and as i write about in the book of its cut air-conditioning, menus, beautiful white linens and silverware, things that these young boys had never seen before. Andd they stop in all the small towns and they got off in chicago to static fields to practice and stretch their legs. Well, it turns out as i was doing my research the origins of the manhattan project, those scientists that were working in the early stages of all the scientific things that produced the bomb, were working in an undisclosed lab about 200 yards or more the oregon state football team was practicing in. And then when they suit up for the game, both teams, in a game that oregon state wongo on janul in the white house at one of the early conferences of thehe were deciding where she was in our allied troops first. Where are we going to attack?.f following this sports journey but also our journey to a war.

Another little-known fact that i discovered is that pearl harbor, when it was attacked, actually to college football teams in hawaii at the time of the attack. The players from a university outside of portland, oregon, were there as was the team from san jose state university. They were there to play a round robin of games against the university of hawaii. So they are there having breakfast, these teams get hee to board buses to go toward the island. They start seeing these bombs.

Drop in the water and they are seeing planes overhead. And these boys turned to the waiters and waitresses and the folks working at the hotel and say, what is going on macs don't worry about it. It's just u.s. Navy exercises. So they go back to eating food coming pretty shortly thereafter the smell of oil after hotel six or seven miles away stores to waver then the smell of oil starts to waver in. Japanese bombers are bonded.

Word comes over the radio quickly and those men restricted into the wind he's worse. They were given guns and told to patrol the street. It could be weeks before most of those boys ever return to the united states. A handful never left hawaii. They served in the army or the national guard, got married, had children and never came home. It's the little tidbits i learned along the way that are fascinating for me. To last stories.

Wallace wade was the head coach at duke university, previously won national championships alabama. During this time he decided that my boys were going into service, so was i. This 49-year-old football coach shocked the world when shortly after the rose bowl loss he enlisted, rose in the ranks, went overseas in 1944, participated after normandy, controlled the 242nd artiller artillery, face battle himself, and at one point at the battle of the bulge in the snowy forest on the edge of belgium, he is freezing and he jumps into a foxhole to try to get some coffee. He says to this young private, may i borrow a cup of coffee. He's freezing, the gentleman takes off his coat, get some coffee and food and wade says to the gentleman what's your name. He said where you from? He said i'm from oregon.

He had playedre on the oregon state resulting that had lost, or had one against wallace wade team. They are in a foxhole twohe years later the muller war here is one of these other quinces of these two teams coming together. There are more of those stories that i write about throughout the book. The winning score was an unbelievable catch by little a guy named jean grey. He got the longest rose bowl touchdown pass in history at the time and it won the game. Four years later those same. Hands and arms i had caught the winning touchdown were now gone.

He fought as a pilot in the war and decided to stay in the army air force and lost both his arms and an awful training accident after the war. This book is meaningful toop me.

I hope for those of you get the chance to read it you can take something away about service and sacrifice in about a unique time in our history. Some of the same things, paying players, academics, concussions, all theam same issues 75 or 80 years ago. I hope you enjoy this book as much as i enjoyed the journey and i'm happy to take some questions. if you have a question, your you please raise hand, i will call on you. The people from cspan would love it if you're feeling comfortable standing when you give us your question. Raise your hand please.

being a sportscaster, do you have a favorite player or favorite team that you follow? you know i can't answer that question. you've got to be a yankee fan. Are you a yankee fan. and i love the yankees. I don't know what to tell you.

I'm a fan of the eagles. applause i grew up in wilmington delaware outside philadelphia. Because of the work i do have backed off my allegiances from pro or college teams. I'm generally a fan of whose ever winning. Other questions. you talk about the decision to cancel the rose bowl?

I think a lot of the other bowls were played near their actual site. what's your name. been price.

thank you for that question. When pearl harbor t got bombed, a lot of folks across america wondered if the game was going to go on. Rose bowl organizers had already set the dig game. Oregon state and duke wanted to play. Some of the men enlisted or went off toca war but we are america. When i can stop just because we got bombed but slowly, day by day there was a backlash for playing the game.

60 people in the stadium in southern california attempting to target the. Japanese bombers. There are still so much insecurity about it. A week after pearl pearl harbor, generalth dewitt in charge of the west coast for the military telegram to the governor of california and said my request, don't play this game and don't have a parade.

The governor at that time abided by their wishes and canceled the game. There were editorials in the observer in the newme york times going back and forth about whether or not we should play this game and when is the right time to restart sports medicine as it was canceled and word spread, chicago raised its hand, the cotton bowl, in nashville, all kinds of cities said why don't you play here. In the end, wallace wade, the head coach of duke was a very powerful coach of the time and said we are in the game, when we hosted here in durham. Very quickly, after the cancellation of the game, it was announceday it would be played in durham, the. Tournament of roses gave it an official sanction so it still counts as an official rose bowl game. There were still people in north carolina that didn't want the game to be played anbecause they thought they would be a target for german bombers coming over.

About it in a book, they wanted to get an aerial shot ofdi the stadium but before they threw flew a plane over they made multiple pa announcements to the crowd to stay look, if you see a plane, it's not the germans, it's actually the good guys trying to take a picture. The great question because it led me too my own thought about 911 which for someone like me is the best i can recollect. A i was too young one vietnam was going on and i wasn't born in korea but i thought about when they played and the closest i can compare to was what i wrote about 75 years.

When is the right time to play sports? Is itri there to get our country back on its feet? Are they there to serve as a necessary distraction or do they take away policing manpower we should be focused on other things other than sports? I don't know the right answer. thank you. Brian, you've written a number of books, could you answer the question, what are your favorite books that you've written, and why? so i have written eight.

I think for me, the two most impactful books because of the difference it made on me, not whether it was a bestseller or not, is probably this book. Because of learning about service and sacrifice in a book a wroted five or six years ago, legacy letters and i was looking for a book to have more meaning. When 911 happened, i was living in los angeles as a sports reporter and always felt guilty that i can do more but i wanted to go to new york, i wanted to help, i wanted to search the rubble at ground zero. All i could do was give blood in los angeles which i did do. Flashforward years later when i was looking for a meaningful book, i wrote about t a camp exist for the children who lost a mom and dad in 911 and i read this article and i said that's my next book. I partnered with an organization called tuesday's children which is still in existence in york which was created to serve the children and the families of 911.

What i did is i decided to see if families would be willing. To write letters to their lost loved one on a ten year anniversary of 911.

The response was overwhelming. I got to know many of the families intimately, as you can imagine there's a lot of emotion, even ten years after so there will be a 14-year-old girl writing a letter to the dad that she lost at such a tender age of the 2-year-old who never knew mom or dad for the widower who still can't get over the loss of her husband and has never gone on a date or move on in life. That book had a clear impact on me.fe makes you want to hold your kids tighter. It gives you better appreciation for how quickly life can disappear. Of all my books, it would be this world were to book and the 911 legacy letters. brian, you mentioned a number of soldiers and players who went on to live 'after words', but for their sake, because you made a point of saying there were four who are killed who never had a chance to have families or have children, do remember their names? thank you for sharing that.

I can remember three of the top of my head. Bob nanny, everett smith, al hoover, and the fourth will come to me. One was killed on patrol. One got off his ship in the waters and was shot before he ever reached the shore. Al hoover was a marine and legend had it that he died on.

is absolutely better. Avidly we know some of the issues going onri in the va today that some people may argue their worst, butle yes, they came home and there is no such thing as ptsd. It wasum called the scars of war or bombso trauma or things like that. The va did exist but it certainly was not there for mental credit w was there if you have lost a limb to try to teach you how to use a prosthetic. For me, after the gulf war we started have a different appreciation for soldiers coming home. While our va services are not where they should be, certainly we understand better the mental cost of war than these gentlemen did because remember, imagine seeing someone's head blown off next you. Imagine seeing the horrors of war and the never ever talking about it.

Not to your wife, not your kids, not to a therapist and then expecting to come home and get a job or finish school, get married ands live happily. That to me is why so many of these gentlemen are the greatest generation.

Because of what they did indoor and were able to carry on and have successful lives. Women, we overlooked, they played an important role in world war ii as well. Weather was on the homefront or serving as nurses, but certainly in those days, we think of the little woman staying at home, taking care of the kids in the gardener while the man went out and that was true for some women, but a lot of women served here on the courtside, americans women federation, putting together and caring for wounded when they came back, et cetera.

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yes, ma'am. you speak to a lot of veterans group and have you been asked to speak to the ones that go to washington d.c., flights of freedom.

i believe it's called honor. That's one of the charities i contributed to in honor of these four gentlemen. Honor flights pays for the flights of world war ii veterans to tour the world war ii memorial which, if any of you have ever done, do it. As far as speaking, i will speak to any veterans group. Characters to veterans in the room or thousand veterans in the room.

Peter never turned down an invitation to one of o those wgroups, i've never gone to d.c. To do it, certainly, if anybody wants to invite me, i will come to it because i feel that's part of my pay back to them. It's the least i can do for their service.

any other questions. yes, ma'am. i can't answer that question and to get a. laughter what's your next book. now i am able to answer the question. I have no idea what my next book is. I did two that came out in the fall of 16, it took a little time off and frankly i'm kind of struggling.

That is not an invitation for any ofa. You to give me an idea. I was joking with bo and chris who have been such gracious host. They asked me what is one m of the most common things. Everyone either wants to know what my next book is or they've got a great story to tell me too write about which probably happens to a lot of authors. I don't know.

I know i'm not going to do it for money, although someone will pay me for it, not going to do it for any other reason then i'm attracted to the story, i'm passionate and it's can make a difference. If i never come across the next 50 years to one of those am i will never read another book, but i only do the right reasons. applause we can have time for one more question. Does anyone have another. haveac you read the book the boys and the vote, and if you have do see the parallels between your book and that book. is a great question.

How many of you have read boys in the vote. How many of you have read fields of battle. You see the problem with having here people. I believe there for sale in the tent. Feel the battle is a tremendous book. The books that laura hildebrand has done unbroken, the genre of historical nonfiction of which this fall then, those books kind of pave the way for publisher and commercial interests in books like this. Taking what is essentially a sports story like rowers in the olympics must a hundred years ago but making it into much more of a cultural story.

And human interest story, in no way am i comparing thei my book to theirs, their books are phenomenal but it all falls in the genre. The publishing world goes in cycles. A book works so whenever he wants tono write a book a matter genre and maybe a few years this genre may die way and maybe in 20 years it will come back again. It just depends.

Obut i'll take one more question. Through them and asked myself the question.

And say brian, what is your one take away from writing this book. Brian, that's a great question. I think the take away is that everybody's life is amazing. To me, whether you fought in war or didn't, whether you've lived a very quiet life here.

In savannah, worked at a company, clocked in for 35 years, raised a good family, your hero to anything too often come in our society, we put s certain folks on pedestals as heroes because of something famous they did for the sacrifices they did, but every day, i was walking over hear from the hotel, looking at people,ut curious about the sacrifices they've made for their own kids or for their marriage or for caring for enell person. For me, while the veterans in war and everything else have become close to my heart, it reaffirmed my belief that everyone has a great story. Everyone should share that story so even if you think your story is important, make sure you share with someone and share with your kids. Unfortunately, those folks that pass away, when you talk to them right before death, they will often say their biggest regret isn't that i didn't write a book or start a movie or make more money if. They wish i had spent more time with my kids were wish i had told my kids more about my life so i know that my legacy will be carried on.

Maybe tonight, bo and chris enders who are so kind as my host and have sponsored, i hope it's okay, they will pay for all your dinners tonight if you go to dinner and share with a loved one your story. Thank you very much. please join me in thanking brian curtis. As you exit the venue, you will see our wonderful volunteers with yellow buckets to accept your donations to the savannah book festival.

It is because of your generosity that we are able to keep the festival free. Please help us to continue. Thank you for coming.