A must-read for military members and their families that is sure to appeal to patriotic Americans of all stripes.
An Arkansas senator and Bronze Star recipient delivers a first book full of information, history, and remarkable facts about true heroes.
The 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment, aka the Old Guard, is the oldest active-duty regiment in the Army. “Since 1948,” writes Cotton, who served in the 3rd between combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, “the Old Guard has served at Arlington as the Army’s official ceremonial unit and escort to the president.” Any soldier seeking to join the Old Guard must meet the highest mental, physical, and moral standards in the military, and they cannot have civil or military convictions or drug, alcohol, or financial issues. Public missions include funerals at Arlington, state funerals, presidential inaugurations, and serving as sentinels at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The recruitment of sentinels is only within the Old Guard, and the training cycle is extremely difficult. It includes learning at least 20 distinct marching movements as well as a test of stamina in which one must stand ramrod still, without bending knees or wiggling toes, maintaining ceremonial composure for 75 minutes. Though some readers may think the author provides too much detail on uniforms, procedure, and training, he explains that in the Old Guard, perfection is not just a goal, it’s an absolute. Pleats and shirt tucks are measured to the inch, stray threads are burned off, and wrinkles are unheard of. Attending multiple funerals in a day, the guard is transported by van, but they’re not allowed to sit down lest they wrinkle their uniforms. As Cotton demonstrates, the uniform prep, cleaning, insignia, and badge placement are stressed continually. Among other reasons, they meet these strict guidelines because a family only gets one funeral; it must be perfect every time. “What the Old Guard does inside the gates of Arlington,” writes the author, “is a testament to the noble truths and fierce courage that have built and sustained America.”
A must-read for military members and their families that is sure to appeal to patriotic Americans of all stripes.Pub Date: May 14, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-286315-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 30, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
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