Ongoing work adds important dimension to Veterans Day observances
Every year around this time my mind is drawn to one of my favorite quotes about any season. This one happens to be about Veterans Day. I don’t entirely agree with its flat observation, but I am moved by its spirit.
“When I was a boy,” writes Kurt Vonnegut in the forward to his novel “Breakfast of Champions,” “ … all the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month. It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the Voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind. Armistice Day has become Veterans Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans Day is not. So I will throw Veterans Day over my shoulder. Armistice Day I will keep. I don’t want to throw away any sacred things.”
I don’t either. But I also cannot go along with Vonnegut’s demotion of Veterans Day. True, in its time, Armistice Day was supposed to mark the human race’s last foray into war’s horrible maw. “The war to end all wars” had ended. Was that not something to celebrate? Of course, it was. But soon enough, we learned the sad truth about that description, and it became more prudent to honor all who serve to protect our freedoms. That commanding self-sacrifice is still a sacred cause
There are still, though, differences in the ways we honor that sanctity.
Beginning last week and again twice this week, we’ve carried in our Neighbor section listings of scores of events scheduled to recognize veterans and honor their service. They include concerts and breakfasts and flag-raisings and a wide array of programs and observances. We carry photographs in today’s edition of some of these.
And, I was particularly drawn to our front page story Wednesday by Susan Sarkauskas about a Naperville organization that helps veterans develop skills they can use to start or own a business.
It is one thing, and an important one, to take time out for words of prayer and thanks to the men and women who have put their lives at risk in order to protect others. It is another, and it even more practical, to demonstrate our gratitude with action.
I’m sure that Devin St. Pierre, an Army vet featured in Sarkauskas’s story, appreciates the community recognition he sees every Veterans Day. I suspect he is even more grateful for opportunities the Veteran Business Project is providing to help him hone his skills and build a career.
Although perhaps unique in its mission and scope, VBP is far from alone among agencies that set out to provide practical help for veterans. Countless groups set out to help vets deal with problems like hunger, homelessness, unemployment, suicide and more. On Wednesday, Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas issued a release describing changes in tax code veterans and their families should be aware of. In August, Palatine-based SALUTE, INC. announced it had received a charitable grant to help support its programs offering emergency financial aid and physical and emotional aid to injured military service members and veterans.
It is ongoing, year-round programs like these that add a special dimension to the Veterans Day observance. Parades and gatherings provide stirring visual reminders of our communities’ gratitude for those who entered military service. Public and private activities turn those reminders into something tangible and meaningful, something perhaps Vonnegut himself would recognize as representative of sacred acts that ought not be thrown away.
• Jim Slusher, jslusher@dailyherald.com, is managing editor for opinion at the Daily Herald. Follow him on Facebook at www.facebook.com/jim.slusher1 and on X at @JimSlusher. His book “To Nudge The World: Conversations, community and the role of the local newspaper” is a 2025 Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year and is available at eckhartzpress.com.