A Memory of Memorial Day School Assemblies

I recently stumbled across this recording on YouTube: The Ballad of Rodger Young, and it brought back a flood of memories of elementary school Memorial Day assemblies.

The song was written by Frank Loesser, known by most of us for his Broadway musical comedies including Guys and Dolls.  Mr. Loesser was a private in the Army during World War II in the Radio Production Unit, and he was assigned to write and edit songs for radio programs, the purpose of which would be for recruitment.  

For one particular task, he was to write a song about a Medal of Honor recipient, and he chose among a list of names Private Rodger Wilton Young, who was killed in action when he drew fire from the enemy so that his company could withdraw from an ambush.  The action occurred in the South Pacific on the island of New Georgia in the Solomons.  Private Young was killed July 31, 1943.  He was 25 years old. 

A poignant and compelling aspect to the story is Private Young had suffered head injuries before he went into the service, which, over time, damaged his eyesight and rendered him nearly deaf.  He refused to be sent to a field hospital and chose to stay with his unit that was entering battle.  This is the description of his actions for which he was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor:

On July 31, 1943, the infantry company of which Pvt. Young was a member, was ordered to make a limited withdrawal from the battle line in order to adjust the battalion's position for the night. At this time, Pvt. Young's platoon was engaged with the enemy in a dense jungle where observation was very limited. The platoon suddenly was pinned down by intense fire from a Japanese machinegun concealed on higher ground only 75 yards away. The initial burst wounded Pvt. Young. As the platoon started to obey the order to withdraw, Pvt. Young called out that he could see the enemy emplacement, whereupon he started creeping toward it. Another burst from the machinegun wounded him the second time. Despite the wounds, he continued his heroic advance, attracting enemy fire and answering with rifle fire. When he was close enough to his objective, he began throwing hand grenades, and while doing so was hit again and killed. Pvt. Young's bold action in closing with this Japanese pillbox and thus diverting its fire, permitted his platoon to disengage itself, without loss, and was responsible for several enemy casualties.

I did not know all this when, as a fifth grader, I learned “The Ballad of Rodger Young” from a music teacher who visited our class once a week and taught us folk songs.  That we year learned “Drill Ye Tarriers, Drill” and “Fifteen Miles on the Erie Canal” and probably a few others I’ve forgotten. 

But the memory of “Rodger Young” came rushing back to me as I heard it for the first time in nearly 50 years, so much that I was able to sing along with the refrain.  It also called to mind our elementary school Memorial Day assemblies.

I don’t suppose they were unique, but they impressed me enough to remember them.  The school janitor would go outside and lower the flag on the flagpole in front of the school.  I could see him from my classroom window.  In a short while, all the grades of this small neighborhood school – there were probably well under 200 children and staff in all – would march out in more or less straight lines and gather around the flagpole.  There would be poems, probably “In Flanders Fields,” and maybe the Gettysburg Address, and then two teen trumpet players from the two different high schools we had in town would arrive in their band uniforms and one would stand before us by the flagpole, but the other one would go off to some short distance away, around the corner of the school where we couldn’t see him.

Then they’d play “Taps” and distant one would be the echo of the other.  It was mournful, and stirring, and I still think about it whenever I hear “Taps” at a commemoration.  Then a few boys who were Boy Scouts, who had worn their uniforms to school that day, would solemnly, and sometimes needing a little help from the janitor, raise the flag again.  Then we’d go back to class.

It didn’t take very long, but it formed an indelible and precious memory. 

This took place in the early-to mid 1970s when the Vietnam War was still limping along and many of us were disgusted and questioning our government.  Many of us had family members and friends in the service, but we never questioned them and held them dear, waiting for their return.   “The Ballad of Rodger Young” was about a World War II soldier who died in combat.  My elementary school was named for a young man in my town who served in World War II and likewise, died in combat.  World War II was still much closer to us then and still in our national consciousness, even though we were engaged in Vietnam (though the draft had ended by this time).

We hung flags on our houses, but protested the war.  Expressing patriotism was not such a conundrum then as it is now, even despite being divided about our participation in Vietnam, perhaps because World War II was still not too distant, and we still felt strongly and were taught by society that fascism was wrong, that Nazis were the bad guys and always would be, and anybody professing their loyalty to authoritarians over the Constitution drew our immediate disgust and distrust.  We wanted the ship of state righted; we didn’t want it torn down nor feces spread on the halls of the Capitol.  We had fought a war against fascism.  Rodger Young died for it.  We knew people in town who had died to preserve democracy.  The value of democracy was still at the heart of every debate. 

But because the Vietnam War, which began before I was born and was still being fought, and over 58,000 Americans died there, Memorial Day celebrations gave us more to think about than dishwater platitudes or the ritual of making enemies of fellow Americans so popular with fascists among us today.

Even to a small child watching the janitor patiently untangle the rope to help the Boy Scouts raise the flag, Memorial Day was somehow deeply personal.  It was quiet, considerate.  Then we went back to class.

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Jacqueline T. Lynch is the author of Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. and Memories in Our Time - Hollywood Mirrors and Mimics the Twentieth Century. Her newspaper column on classic films, Silver Screen, Golden Memories is syndicated nationally.  Her new book, a collection of posts from this blog - Hollywood Fights Fascism - is available here on Amazon.