Coquina Crossing Soldier Support, under the direction of Patty Worsham has been most successful. To date 565 packages containing socks, T-shirts, toiletries, magazines and batteries have been sent to American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Currently packages are being sent to a Special Forces encampment close to the Afghanistan/Pakistan border and to a hospital near Kabul. Approximately 100 men and 20 women are assigned to the medical unit. Recently 173 watch caps knitted by the Coquina Mad Hatters were sent to the Special Forces unit. Coquina Crossing Soldier Support, in conjunction with the Coquina Quilters, have sent 56 hand-made quilts to the Landstuhl Hospital in Germany and nine more quilts are ready to be sent. These quilts are given to badly wounded soldiers (especially those with burns), who have been transfered by air from Iraq to Germany.
Shipping is expensive and contributions to Coquina Crossing Soldier Support would be greatly appreciated.
Work on the Korean War documentary is progressing and being done with the cooperation of The Art Institute of Jacksonville and digital film-making Professor Dr. Nadia Ramoutar. More than 80 Korean veterans responded to a questionnaire distributed by Michael Rothfeld. Earl Kidwell and Bill Napper have interviewed about 25 veterans to provide the basic material for the documentary. They are now in the process of choosing who will be featured in the film. The choice is difficult because the interviewees all have interesting stories.
The documentary is scheduled to be recorded in October and November and to be edited in December 2008. Sound, titles, music will then be added and the documentary should be completed in February or March 2009. We have contacted WJCT-TV and they are interested in showing the documentary. Ideally, we would like to premier the documentary on Veterans Day, 2009 at the Flagler College Auditorium.
Watch for updates as our projects develop.
We will start to record interviews of the Korean War veterans on Tuesday, October 14. On October 7, we recorded segments of our historian discussing the history of the Korean War, why it was significant and why it differed from World War II and the Viet Nam War.
Our documentary is tentatively titled, Korea: Forgotten War, Remembered Heroes. We have interviewed more than thirty Korean War veterans from northeast Florida and have chosen six individuals to be featured in the documentary. We are working closely with The Art Institute of Jacksonville. Its students will record and edit the documentary. Our hope is to premier the finished documentary at the Flagler College Auditorium around Veterans Day 2009 and to have it shown on WJCT TV.
