“I believe in the United States of America as a Government of the people by the people, for the people; whose just powers are derived by the consent of the governed; a democracy in the Republic; a sovereign nation of many sovereign states; a perfect union, one of inseparable; established upon those principles of freedom, equality, justice and humanity for which American patriots sacrificed their lives and fortunes. “I therefore believe it is my duty to my country to love…..
WHILE ONLY SEVENTEEN years old, I wanted to enlist in the United States Marine Corps; but the age for enlistment was eighteen, and I could not get my parents’ consent because they thought seventeen was entirely too young to go off to a war of this magnitude. Since both my parents had witnessed WWI, with Dad having been involved in it, they actually knew I was too young to enter the service. However, a few short months later, upon reaching…..
Not long after the United States went to war, my family sold their “little red wagon” farm and moved to an area where jobs could be found in support of President Roosevelt’s call to each and every citizen to do whatever they could to help in this imminent situation. Therefore, we went to live near Brookley Air Force Base in Mobile, Alabama, where Dad sought employment with Civil Service, and my eldest brother joined the US Coast Guard and prepared for…..
WHEN MAJOR CATASTROPHES occur, almost everyone can recall exactly what they were doing when asked, “Where were you when . . .?” December 7, 1941, was a cool, partly cloudy day, and I was in the backyard. We lived on a small farm in Central Mississippi. It was about eight thirty in the morning, and I was looking at the pomegranate tree that I had planted a couple of years previously as a project for our school’s 4H Club. So it…..
AFTER SUFFERING WITH indescribable horrifying health conditions from exposure to ionizing radiation since September 23, 1945, I was driven to expose the effects of this illness and to show what a total displeasure it has been to go through life by suffering by degrees from such a horrible sickness. And, because America’s atomic-war veterans in general have been living with ionized radiation exposure, some of whom are suffering more than others, and because many thousands gave their lives to atomic radiation,…..
Welcome. My name is John D. Bankston, author of Invisible Enemies of Atomic Veterans. I’m so happy to have you as a visitor to my blog about my new book. This project is very special to me, and I hope to share some of that excitement with you here. I’ll be using this blog to interact with you about Invisible Enemies of Atomic Veterans, expanding on some of the topics in it and posting on some of the ideas related…..