November 6, 2017 Veterans History Project Launches Web Feature Recognizing Medal of Honor Recipients

Press Contact: Benny Seda-Galarza (202) 707-8732
Public Contact: Megan Harris (202) 707-8205
Website: Stories Above and Beyond: The Medal of Honor

The Library of Congress’ Veterans History Project (VHP) today launched its latest “Experiencing War” website feature, titled “Stories Above and Beyond: The Medal of Honor,” which offers access to nearly 150 digitized collections of Medal of Honor recipients. The veterans’ service spans World War II to the recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Each collection uniquely illustrates the evident courage and intrepidity of these veterans.

One of the featured collections is of Shizuya Hayashi, a Japanese-American World War II veteran who, along with 20 of his comrades from the 100th Infantry Battalion, was awarded the Medal of Honor in 2000. Another is Vietnam War Army medic Alfred Rascon, who used his body to shield his comrades from incoming grenades during a firefight. The Charles Kettles collection is also included in the feature. After his oral history recording session, Kettles’ interviewer successfully lobbied Congress to award him the Medal of Honor in 2016, approximately 50 years after his valorous actions in Vietnam.

Go to loc.gov/vets/stories/ex-war-moh.html to access these and other veterans’ collections included in “Stories Above and Beyond: The Medal of Honor.”

VHP web feauture also provides links to Library of Congress resources on the Medal of Honor, as well as to an upcoming series of related posts on the Library’s Folklife Today blog. To access all of the content, visit blogs.loc.gov/folklife/.

The U.S. military’s highest and most prestigious individual award for valor, the Medal of Honor is given only to individuals who have risked their lives in going above and beyond the call of duty during combat. Since 1861, the Medal of Honor has been awarded to 3,499 people, only 72 of whom are still living. The featured VHP collections were donated to the Library of Congress through the generosity of individual oral history interviewers, as well as the Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation.

Congress created VHP in 2000 to collect, preserve and make accessible the firsthand remembrances of America’s war veterans from WWI through the more recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, so that future generations may hear directly from veterans and better understand the realities of war. For more information, visit loc.gov/vets/ or call the toll-free message line at (888) 371-5848. Subscribe to the VHP RSS to receive periodic updates of VHP news. Follow VHP on Facebook @vetshistoryproject.

The Library of Congress is the world’s largest library, offering access to the creative record of the United States—and extensive materials from around the world—both on-site and online. It is the main research arm of the U.S. Congress and the home of the U.S. Copyright Office. Explore collections, reference services and other programs and plan a visit at loc.gov; access the official site for U.S. federal legislative information at congress.gov; and register creative works of authorship at copyright.gov.

 

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PR 17-149
2017-11-07
ISSN 0731-3527