Holidays are notoriously frustrating days to be in the newsroom.
How
do you keep things interesting? Informative? Engaging for your viewers,
readers and listeners? How do you avoid the cookie-cutter parade story?
First tip: Start thinking early.
That's
why my editor, Meg Martin, and I compiled some of our favorite
Memorial Day weekend stories from five years of Al's Morning
Meeting. We tried to update the stories with the latest
information we could find. The ideas include links to the
original Al's Morning Meeting columns in which they appeared.
Remembering MIAs on Memorial Day
Al's Morning Meeting reader Cheryl Hosmer, a Redford, Mich.,
writer/nonfiction book editor, sent a terrific story idea for Memorial
Day.
The Department of Defense says there are still 88,000 official MIAs -- servicemen and servicewomen who went missing in action.
Of the 88,000 Americans missing in action from WWII, the Korean War,
the Cold War, the Vietnam War and Desert Storm, 1,833 are from the
Vietnam War, with 1,397 of those within the country of Vietnam. Another
750 Americans have been accounted for since the end of the Vietnam War,
with 524 of those from the country of Vietnam.
There are "official" pages summarizing the work being done in various countries to identify and find MIAs.
Here is the official Department of Defense Web site on MIAs.
Here is a list of the Service Casualty Offices for each military branch, which work with the families of soldiers missing in action.
Story originally ran in the May 26, 2005 edition of Al's Morning Meeting.
Taped "Taps"
Because the demand for "Taps" [a note of caution: this link will automatically play the song] players at military funerals far outweighs the number of buglers available, many military funerals now
include a recorded version of "Taps." The problem is there are only 500 buglers available to play at the
1,800 funerals a day that are eligible for military ceremonies in
America. The Department of Defense says:
The Department worked with private industry to invent a small device
that can be inserted deep into the bell of a bugle that plays a very
high-quality rendition of Taps virtually indistinguishable from a live
bugler. The rendition used for the bugle was recorded at Arlington
National Cemetery on Memorial Day, 1999.
The ceremonial bugle Web site said, at the time, "During its 6-month
test period in the state of Missouri, Ceremonial Bugles were played at
over 1,000 funerals and received overwhelming positive reviews, from
Funeral Directors, Military and Veteran Service Organization personnel
providing Military Funeral Honors, and most importantly, from family
members themselves."
DoD says:
The ceremonial bugle is intended to be a dignified alternative to
pre-recorded Taps played on a stereo, but will not be used as a
substitute for a military musician when one is available.
"We will ask families if they would like to take advantage of this
new technology to honor their loved ones," said [Deputy Assistant
Secretary of Defense John M.] Molino. "In addition to the very high
quality sound, it provides a dignified 'visual' of a bugler playing
taps, something families tell us they want."
To use the device, a member of an honor guard pushes a button and
holds the bugle to his or her lips. It offers several other advantages
over a stereo, including increased reliability.
Click here to see how it works.
To find buglers in your area, check out the Web site of an organization called Bugles Across America.
For more on the history of "Taps," here is a link to a page on the Arlington National Cemetery site.
Most Do Little to Honor Vets on Memorial Day
What will Americans be doing on Memorial Day? A 2000 Gallup poll showed
that the number-one activity on the Memorial Day holiday was "just
staying around the house," followed by attending a picnic or barbeque.
About three out of 10 said that they would be going to a veterans'
cemetery or a veteran's grave, and one out of five said that they would be going to
a Memorial Day parade.
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RELATED RESOURCES
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Other Poynter Online coverage of Memorial Day and related story ideas:
"It Won't Win a Pulitzer, But It's Important," by Chris Lavin
It is two days before a major American holiday. Your editor walks up
from behind and taps you on the shoulder. The newspaper's readers, she
explains, will be celebrating and a story is needed to reflect the
somber/joyous/historical sweep of the moment.
You react like journalists all over America have reacted to such an assignment since time began. You think:
* Who did I offend?
* Can my career get any more dismal?
* Could these editors be more unimaginative/unprepared/stupid?
* Isn't this what interns are for?
"War Stories, Then and Now," by Ellen Heltzel
A forgotten D-Day heroine reminds us (1) what we owe to the "greatest generation" or (2) how much times have changed.
"Reporting on War's Human Cost," by Chip Scanlan
Excerpt: My editor friend was shocked. "You've never read the 'Little Duck' story?" she said one day last summer.
"Little
Duck," she explained, was the nickname of a young Kentucky soldier
whose body was returned to his hometown from Vietnam. Written by John
Fetterman, a writer for the Sunday magazine of the Louisville Times and Courier-Journal, the story about his homecoming won the 1969 Pulitzer Prize for local news.
"Military Reporting," by Julie Silverstein Gray
Ideas and insights on covering the armed forces.
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Swimmers and Boaters Beware: Carbon Monoxide Poisoning
WSMV-TV
(Nashville, Tenn.) investigative reporter Nancy Amons produced an
investigation into carbon monoxide poisoning around houseboats.
Amons discovered that people were dying by swimming near the exhaust of the boat engines. She reports:
...six other families in Tennessee weren't as lucky.
Statewide, four adults and two children have died in the last five
years, poisoned in the open air behind their houseboats.
One
of them was Patricia Driscolll, who died in June 2000. Her husband
found her body floating 30 feet from their Gibson houseboat. She'd been
cleaning algae from the hull.
"I would say to people, it only takes an instant," Pat Driscoll, her husband, says. No one knows how many have died nationwide.
Amons
also says, "A federal investigation is underway to try to stop the
deaths. On May 15th, there was barely a dry eye at a subcommittee
hearing of the U.S. House of Representatives as the parents of two boys
who died last year testified:
I'm Bambi Dixey and I'm the mother that lost two boys in a
tragic boating accident nine months ago due to carbon monoxide
poisoning. Logan was 8. Dillon, 11. Last August, they were houseboating
on a lake bordering Arizona and Utah. Their friends saw them go into
convulsions and sink.
Personal Watercraft
Memorial Day weekend is a time when a lot of people hit the water. One
of the hottest topics on the water these day are the use of jet skies,
or "personal watercraft," as they are sometimes called. It certainly would be a good story for you to explore on Monday.
States have begun
requiring a license to drive those things, and some lakes and waterways
are banning them because of the noise. Here is a state-by-state list of the laws.
One of the loudest opponents to jet skis is the Bluewater Network environmental group. The group's Web site says:
At Lake Mead in Nevada, the Park Service estimates that on
a busy weekend jet skis release 27,000 gallons of gas and oil into the
park's waters. Unlike motorboats, jet skis are designed to maneuver
into remote, shallow areas where a variety fragile plants and animals
live. Studies have shown that jet ski users routinely harass waterfowl
in their nesting areas, as well as marine mammals such as dolphins,
seals, humpback whales and manatees.
Bluewater Network claims:
Personal watercraft are often a nuisance and a safety
threat. According to U.S. Coast Guard statistics, jet skis represent
roughly 10 percent of all boats, yet are involved in approximately 30
percent of all boating accidents. Boaters, shoreline hikers, and
wildlife enthusiasts complain that the noise from personal watercraft
ruin their outdoor experience.
On the other side, the jet-ski enthusiasts are represented by the American Watercraft Association.
The National Park Service banned the use of jet skis in some parks but recently opened some others.
According to a 2000 study for the Noise Pollution Clearinghouse:
Jet ski noise is different from that of motorboats.
The heart of the difference, and the crux of the jet ski noise problem,
is that jet skis continually leave the water. This magnifies their
noise impact in two ways.
First, minus the muffling effect of the water, the jet ski engine's exhaust is much louder, typically by 15 dBA. As a result, an
airborne jet ski has the same noise impact on a listener at the water’s
edge as an in-water jet ski 8 times further away, or the same as 32
identical in-water jet skis at the same distance.
Second,
each time the jet ski re-enters the water, it smacks the surface with
an explosive "whomp" -- sometimes with a series of them.
National Cemeteries Expanding
As Americans turn our attention to Memorial Day, we should recognize
that our national cemeteries are straining to keep up with the demand for burial space. By
2008, America is to have completed the largest expansion of veteran
cemeteries since the Civil War.
The National Cemetery Expansion Act of 2003 authorized the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
to establish six new national cemeteries to serve veterans in the areas
of Bakersfield, Calif.; Birmingham, Ala.; Jacksonville, Fla.; Sarasota
County, Fla.; southeastern Pennsylvania and Columbia-Greenville, S.C.
All of the areas have veteran populations exceeding
170,000 -- the threshold VA has established for new national
cemeteries.
The Chicago Tribune reported in 2005:
Since 1973, the number of interments annually at national cemeteries has grown by more than 150 percent, from 36,422 to 93,033 last year.
To handle that increase, the Department of Veterans Affairs is
adding cemeteries, such as the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in
Elwood, Ill., about 50 miles southwest of Chicago. The 982-acre burial
ground opened in 1999, and an additional 11 national cemeteries are
scheduled to be ready by 2010.
That will increase the number of graves available for veterans and
their dependents by 85 percent, according to Richard Wannemacher, the
acting head of the department's memorial affairs division.
"We're in the largest expansion of the national cemetery system
since the Civil War," said Wannemacher, whose division runs 120
national cemeteries and a program to place headstones or markers on the
graves of veterans buried in conventional cemeteries. "Our goal is to
honor every veteran with a burial space or a headstone."
In 1862, as bodies piled up during the carnage of the Civil War,
President Abraham Lincoln signed into law a measure to purchase
cemetery grounds "for soldiers who shall have died in the service of
the country." That act created the first 14 national cemeteries.
Currently an estimated 1,800 veterans die every day, of which 1,075
served during World War II. As veterans of the Korean and Vietnam Wars
age, deaths of former service personnel are projected to rise until
2008, when they will peak at an annual total of 676,000.
The high demand for full military funerals at Arlington National
Cemetery, probably America's most famous burial ground, has resulted in
a waiting list for burials that runs from a few weeks to a couple of
months, depending on the time of year.
The problem is not a shortage of space. Arlington, which is run by
the Army and has restrictions on who can be buried there, has enough
acreage to last until 2060, a spokeswoman said. The delays are caused
by the limited number of personnel to perform such ceremonial functions
as playing taps and firing salutes.
Story originally ran in the May 30, 2005 edition of Al's Morning Meeting.
Who Qualifies to be Buried at a National Cemetery?
Many World War II veterans never signed up for VA benefits; they just
came home from war and got on with their lives. Now, their families are
not in the loop and don't know that the national cemeteries are
available. Here is a site that explains everything.
The Chicago Tribune piece said:
The cemetery administration,
which had a budget of $317 million last year, has stepped up its
efforts to tell veterans that they qualify for a benefit that can save
survivors hundreds of dollars in funeral expenses. Any veteran who was
honorably discharged is eligible for a free grave site and marker in a
national cemetery. Spouses and dependent children of veterans also
qualify. The federal government pays for maintaining the graves in
perpetuity.
Find a Vet Burial Site
Here is an interesting Web site that helps you to find a veteran's gravesite. The locator looks for veterans and their dependents buried in VA National Cemeteries.
Medals for Vets
Several years ago, my mother, who is a veteran, mentioned to me that
she had never applied for her military service medals. I mailed off
information and got them for her and presented them to her on July 4.
It is not hard to do. Here is a Web site to get you started. This would be a real service for folks.
The Burial Flags
I didn't know this: The VA says
many of the American flags that national cemeteries display on holidays
and for special events are actually burial flags that were donated by
the families of deceased veterans. What a moving tribute.
Memorial Day History
Here is a Web site with lots of resources.
We are always looking for your great ideas. Send Al a few sentences and hot links.
Editor's Note: Al's Morning Meeting is a compendium of ideas,
edited story excerpts and other materials from a variety of Web sites,
as well as original concepts and analysis. When the information comes
directly from another source, it will be attributed and a link will be
provided whenever possible. The column is fact-checked, but depends
upon the accuracy and integrity of the original sources cited. Errors
and inaccuracies found will be corrected. AP, May 26, 2006 A tiny White House commission has...
