1994: 50th Anniversary of D-Day Montrose Beach Chicago, IL

 I had been doing Civil War re-enacting about four years at the time. A fellow reenactor invited me to attend the Chicago event with him and his unit which was based out of the St. Louis area. Even at that time, strict political correctness guidelines were to be observed. There was no SS troops allowed, no display of the swastika, and of course IL is a machinegun "non-friendly" state. So, there were no machineguns (the automatic sounds heard in the video are from gas guns). It was estimated that between 500,000-750,000 spectators were present. The special effects were great. It was like a huge movie set. There were designated seats for 2,500 veterans who were actually at D-Day. That had to be increased to accommodate over 5,000 (I got to talk with several interesting veterans and was thanked by dozens for "keeping history alive"). I was hooked to say the least. Below is a picture taken the evening before the event. I am the second guy from the right (a lot of water has ran over the dam since then. I was about to turn 31. That is the same age my granddaddy was when he landed at Normandy 06 Juni 1944).