The weekend of May 2-3 saw the World War 2 Guys participate in our first ever "Spring" Timeline Weekend. Working with Superintendent Jason Grof as our coordinator, we were able to do a slightly smaller scale version of our big September Timeline which is a favorite unit event. For this event we had Donnie representing the 507th PIR during its training period in Alliance, Nebraska. Dom was representing the 507th PIR in Normandy wearing the iconic M42 Jump Suit. Eric was representing the U.S. Marine Corps in Korea at the 1951 Battle of the Punchbowl. Rhys was representing the 173rd Airborne Brigade in Vietnam. Once again Joe brought out his excellent 5th Special Force Group impression for Vietnam. And to round out our group, Davan was representing the 82nd Airborne in the early 2000's. The weather was fantastic the entire weekend with sunny skies and light breezes. We took part in the 3:00 afternoon whiskey ration on Saturday and were invited to the reenactors' supper in the early evening. We gathered around the big tent at sunset to talk about all things history and the day's events. Sunday saw fewer visitors to the fort but our group still had a fun time hanging out and talking history. We're already excited to get back to the fort in September for the much larger Fall Timeline!

On Saturday, April 29, the World War 2 Guys gathered for our annual Spring Training event. We held our event at historic Fort Atkinson which stood in for Alliance Army Air Base in far western Nebraska. The time period for the weekend was the spring of 1943 wearing HBT Coveralls with Jump Boots, M-1941 Field Jackets, and typical web gear. We had seven enthusiastic troopers in attendance making this one of our larger training events. Leading quite a bit of the training was our top-notch Sergeant Patzke, who did an excellent job keeping us educated, on schedule, and out of trouble. Some of the afternoon highlights were a uniform and equipment class led by Corporal Green, rifle drill and marching on the parade ground, and even a little recreational baseball time. For supper, Sarge cooked us up a delicious meal of beef stew with bread, tea, and apple pie for dessert. Following dining room clean-up, we did a spirited unit field march and practiced our hand signals and squad field formations. We even took out a pesky sniper hidden in the Powder Magazine! This was followed by a nighttime showing of the 1949 Van Johnson film "Battleground" right on the west wall of the fort. This was a really neat activity out under the starry sky, imagining what it must have been like in the Army long ago. Our overnight stay in the fort's barracks was fairly comfortable in our 1820's era bunks. In the morning there were donuts and coffee as well as some light unit calisthenics. As the weekend came to a close, we all realized that this was quite possibly the best training event we've ever done as a unit. We're already tossing around some ideas for 2024 and ways to make this event even better!