Posted: Wednesday, September 3, 2008 12:15 pm

The Messenger 09.03.08

Author Michael Freeland will read from and sign copies of his book, “Blood River to Berlin: The World War II Journal of an Army Medic,” 2-4 p.m. Sept. 10 at the Paul Meek Library at the University of Tennessee at Martin.
The World War II era represents a defining period in U.S. history, a time when the nation as a whole was united with a common goal. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor mobilized the nation under President Franklin Roosevelt in a campaign to defeat the Germans, Italians and Japanese.
More than half a century after it ended, World War II remains the most destructive conflict in human history. It involved all the major industrial countries, wrought unparalleled destruction, and it targeted civilians to an unprecedented extent.
Young men from all ranks of life enlisted in the armed services. Some young women also enlisted in the new women’s services. On the home front, others became Red Cross volunteers making bandages, meeting troop trains with coffee and cookies. All segments of society were affected by food rationing and shortages of gasoline, automobiles and other essentials. For the first time in history, women went off to work in war plants and industry. Rosie the Riveter became as much an icon as Uncle Sam; children bought war savings bonds, collected scrap metal and paper.
Freeland is an Austin Peay State University professor. He returned to the battlefields in 2005 with a group of veterans. “Blood River to Berlin” is an eye-witness account of a World War II combat veteran, detailing his experiences as a young army medic in Germany during the last days and hours of World War II.
The experience of veterans represents a vast library of knowledge that is closing at the rate of 1,500 per day (the estimated number of World War II veterans who die each day.) The publisher is Proctor’s Hall Press in Sewanee.
Freeland was a businessman in Carroll and Benton counties, where he established radio stations WFWL, WHDM and WKTA-FM.