Memorial Day: ‘Freedom isn’t free’

Speakers at Springfield’s Memorial Day program made it clear that freedom isn’t free. 

Men and women have given their lives and paid in many other ways for this country’s freedom since it began.

Brown County Veterans Service Officer Greg Peterson, who was stationed at Charleston, S.C., during his service with the U.S. Air Force, talked about the battles at Fort Sumter — one that pulled America together and the other that nearly split our nation. “Three-quarters of a million soldiers and all others unfortunate to get in the way lost their lives in the Civil War, Peterson said.

 Legionnaire John Moritz, who read the Roll Call of War Veterans, reminded the audience that 110,000 U.S. lives were lost during World War I; more than 400,000 U.S. Men and women died in World War II, and since that time another 100,000 men and women died in battles in Korea and Southeast Asia.