Lets get the show on, the road here this morning. You already all right. Lets here is the 30 that our man weve gone covid. We postpone for a hurricane and boy, youre all still here. I think maybe were just youre like the trekkies we going to call you the benders and what are we going to do . Im nick mueller, president ceo emeritus of the National World war two museum. And i just want welcome everybody here for this anniversary symposia and reunion and what a better venue to than where we are today the United States freedom the boeing center. A lot of your long time friends of the museum been here numerous times and have attended other conferences and travel programs been with us on the easy company from england, the eagles nest, some of the future guests who also participated on those programs. But we also see a lot of new faces and welcome to all of you and youre the first time here. It wont be the last time, but you all testimony and a test admit to the legacy of the hbo mini series and the brothers and audience. This has nothing more needs to be said. And theres 8000 of you out there. I live stream and maybe many more by so thank you all for tuning in and sorry you cant be here with us. We just love and appreciate your interest and support and keeping the stories of the band of brothers and World War Two alive. Before we get started in keeping with the tradition id like to recognize World War Two veterans and homefront workers and Holocaust Survivors, but we have one special guest and i know everybody wants to stand up and, recognize that World War Two veterans. But what wed like do is have you all stay seated so we can see the World War Two veterans and recognize them and just clap. We have mr. George mcalpin battle the bulge veteran 35th engineer of battalion will join right here a. Whos. George was with us for the 75th anniversary battle of the bulge a tour and were so grateful you could join us and any other veterans of world two that might be here please stand also. Homefront workers our Holocaust Survivors will sadly we dont have any others with us. George here. Thank you all, though, being here. Its an honor to have you at the museum. I would like to ask veterans of all wars and active or inactive servicemen, veterans and active service, please stand wherever you are. Thank you for your service. We always honor all of the people in the military active our veterans. And this is a place where we honor them and honor us by your presence. Becky mackey, executive Vice President , should be doing this introduction right now, but she fell ill and was unable to join us. But she asked me to recognize a few other of featured guests who were instrumental helping to make this symposium a reality. So if you would stand and others remain seated again, virtually she played down right over here. Uh. Kirk is also a member, the president ial counselors of distinguished historians and Museum Leaders who meet with us once a year and helps to tell us what to do, what were getting right, what were getting wrong, and what we ought to be doing. So, curtis looked at the hip with us here. Thank you very much, kirk, and any others from, plato, who are here. I know a few others. So thank you all, michael cutler, to portray denver. Bill randall. Michael, are you right here . Everybody. Frank john. He played bill going here. Was the call that portrayed joe. Weve got very. And finally, though, hes not with us today, jimmy, mario played frank for country was with us every step of the way and planning this symposium. So a big shout out thank you to him and i also mentioned recognized and tippers daughter carrie tipper i dont know where you are if youre here to wave or stand up, but youll see her later on for sure. In any event, welcome to all of you and thank you. And thanks also to the entire other cast of cast members and crew of band of brothers, as well as other Family Members of easy company who joined, for this important occasion. Well, a lot of people to thank and especially would say also our president my successor who happens to be in normandy right now with the governor of louisiana. So he could not be here as well. And our travel team, who had the idea to do this with a number of years ago and its and kurt sadoski, others who made it happen and our institute for study of war and democracy looked at him also with this program. But we have sponsors, too. And the reality is you cant do any of these things without sponsors. And just let me list their names real quickly. Ryan anderson and cameron batchelor. Great and then mcdonald and their family of lubbock, texas, rick and cathy ramsey and their son Sean Jonathan reagan and the miller family, larry and penny should robert siegel, richard dallas foundation, hbo aviation, atlantic and barrington of the flying classroom and melvin caroline and jordan of the gallery. They galatoires a few of you got to eat last night fabulous dinner with some our featured cast crew and sponsor and a big thank you to Hancock Whitney are presenting sponsor and without them we might not be here so thank you all again for your support all of those sponsors and i would like also recognize youll come up in a few moments. Michael bell dr. Michael bell is our new executive director. Not new anymore, i guess, since last. And the institute is a collection of great historians who inform everything we do here in the way of our programs our tours and our publications. And so were just excited to have michael board. He was an honor west point grad 33 years in the military and and had assignments at every level from platoon to pentagon staff and hes going to be a master of ceremonies and will follow me in just a moment. So lets get this underway. I think im pretty much on schedule. Becky was going to introduce, but ive already introduced myself. So, you know who i am and she had asked me to. Do a little fly through of how this museum got have had a Little Something to do with it. And youll know a little bit more about that. The only 15 minutes ive got to compress 33 years and 15 minutes. So really is going to be a quick through, fly through and. So let me at this go in here. There, steven. And so that gives you a clue came out of our friendship. Im going to run through about nine slides really quick there all. Connected together, connected to the story. I think youll figure it out as go as i go along. Im not going to talk about it now, but of course know that higgins landing part Steve Ambrose in, normandy, that little gazebo in his backyard where we hang out hung out too much and in the eighties drank too Much Research part where the museum was supposed to be. You know who that is. All right heres a and those are different where we ended up so have you been there right across the street a Ribbon Cutting its june 2000 youll recognize some people there our master plan and and the brothers so lets on and go back to the story so Steve Ambrose was my best friend in new orleans. Were both the History Department 71 till the day he died as son who many of you know he remembers a very much involved with the production of band of brothers kirk and others. And so it was this friendship. Now look you just got to understand we did everything together our families grew up together. We hiked, camped in the rockies, traveled to europe together to normandy, central europe. We was used to doing things together, you know, hed have an idea. I have an idea. I mean. I told him we got to buy a sailboat a 40 foot. He didnt know how to sail the well. How much is going to cost . Well, thousand. Well, how are we going to pay for it . I said well, ill start at sailing school. Well do it that way, well hire some people to run it. We did then we got into scuba diving says well lets buy a dive resort. So we did rented for five years and, then owned the house together. Saint john and the virgin islands. So just want you to know that we did one hell of a lot of things and it a common communal love of history though military and diplomatic that drew us together and we were used to doing big things. One of those was were the tours that we did normally started those in 1980, and i helped organize and i was doing international for the university of new orleans and and there was major howard from the pegasus bridge, same as the end of the talking there. And he started to meet people like howard and and other veterans along the way. And that led to him saying, lets start now, center for leadership studies at u. A. And i was dean by then, and i said, okay well find some space. We can get his oral histories transcribed. Then he did over a thousand of them by the time of of our fateful conversation in 1990. And of course, did the books on dday for 94 and band of brothers, pegasus citizen soldiers flowed out of those oral histories. And before i talk about just say band of brothers, the easy company, were in new orleans around 990 for a reunion. And we was collecting those stories he found out about. They were here and he went to his hotel room and he kind of burst in there. He said, im Steve Ambrose and im going to im collect stories. Im going to get yours and im going to write the book. And he did. And this is back yeah that was our Hewlett Packard moment. All right. This is kind of how it happened. Everybody tells very different. There were only two of us there. So now we start started off with a cheap yellow sherry that he always served every afternoon. No stuff that we could go longer with that jerry. And he said, i got an idea. So were going to start a little small dday museum in your Research Park that you are building right on the beaches where Andrew Higgins just landed craft eight told me, generalizing from the president that hear from new orleans who built the landing. The man who won World War Two because his boats enabled us to get over an open beach. Were here. Tell the congress theyre never gonna do anything. World war two. Were just going to do it right. And ive a thousand oral histories. My book on dday is coming out years 1994 for the anniversary were going to have that museum up assets. They asked. Lets do it. Just like the sailboat, huh . So. Well, i said set. Oh, good, thats great something going to cost 1,000,000, i think. Come on. You dont know anything about this kind of stuff. Its going to be at least 4 million. Oh, god, no. Cant ever. You can never raise that much money. Well, of course, the higgins Landing Craft was the motivator. Theres the research part, and you can see in the left corner there is the pencil, the higgins Landing Craft. And so that was idea unlikely story 33 years ago that a couple of a history professor sat down and look, we were a little cocky. Steve had a big name but we always got about bringing history to life. And this was a way he thought to preserve those stories is easy companies veterans of all of the veterans of dday normandy and ultimately a war too. So we had a site we had a call. We had the higgins connection, we had freelance. And somebody said, well, you know, get some money from congress. You got a chance. So said steve, you got to go up and talk to our. He did. And me up right after the meeting and he says, got everything we need. I said, how much . He said, 4 million. I said, where did you get that . Is it from you . I said, that was over three. It wasnt a Feasibility Study anyway. It was enough and a lot of ups and, downs in the nineties. I mean we were broke several times and steve had enough money, he kept the only secretary we had employed a couple times, but we didnt know anything. The building, a museum, you know, we made we didnt know what we didnt know what we were getting into. But we wrestled to the ground and ten years and 20 million later, we opened across the street there. Some of you have have been there. So that is the end up. And that story was the start of another story. Thats the warehouse on the right side, the louisiana memorial pavilion, where we opened ten years ago. And was the opening right there. And you can see a lot of dignitaries there. The ones youll recognize. Thank and to the right, steve spielberg, senator landrieu being the secretary going. It was an amazing three days. I mean, it wasnt just the Ribbon Cutting. We had 200,000 people on the streets of new all or any of you there. Raise your hand if you were there. I know some of you were saying, look at how many people are in today. New orleans and america. Ill never forget it was broadcast, televised worldwide. Some 600 Million People saw it. The people on we had 80 trucks filled with dday veterans and everybody on the either side of the road saying thank you thank you for your service. You saved democracy saved our freedom. It was quite a day and went on after that to Great Success after we opened and. Then steven cook thats the look you know we it we did it starting in that too much area anyway it was a we said okay we thought it was finished you could relax but then along senator ted stevens stevens, senator stevens and Steve Ambrose friends and he said, you guys, you left out the channel india theater where i fought and that was a it was a distinguished flying cross army air corps. And danny, in a way, in the mediterranean. And he says, you left out the mediterranean. You looked at lot of things you cant do. Dday. This is the best Military Museum in the country but youve got to do the whole war. And if you guys agree to do that, ill help. Well, we were a little bit reluctant, but we said wed try and. I stepped down as chairman. Id been jim for a couple of years. By the time i became president , ceo. And sadly, steve died in 2002. So he did not live to see what you see around you. But he was there for the beginning of the dream and the beginning of the planning that resulted in this. 407 Million Capital Campaign that just concluded after 23 years. And we opened the dday museum, the only thing connected to that early story all those great is the 4 million in the 407 million. So the moral of story is be careful how much you drink with your very best friend and a good idea. Today, Congress Says not today. 2004 designated this museum as the official museum for World War Two and by congressional resolution rank number three or four as the most Popular Museum in america, tripadvisor and seven or eight most popular in the in the world. And before covid hit, we were pushing toward a million visitors a year. And were to get there. So now i am president , ceo. Americas got great people like bell, who in the institute this museums who are carrying the vision forward. Steven watson my successor is going to finish the pavilion right there the last one liberation and you liberation was part of the band of Brothers Story at the end the mission of this museum is to tell the American Experience in the that changed the world why it was fought out was one and what it means today any answer the question so what the so what . 50 years from now even today why why was it important that we won that war . But weve always wanted to tell it through eyes of those who were there and. That starts with ambroses book and the brothers, both ministry are our exhibit, our programs are tours, conferences, programs like this. Its still. And the personal stories are at the core of how this museum tells the story we never lose sight of, the values of the courage, the sacrifice, you know, the in our programs, they always the beating heart of this museum that steve, of course i said earlier interview winters theres going to clip from his most of you know it he said this to i was praying to live through it praying that we wouldnt fail every man i think up in his mind how am i going to react under fire youve never been tested under fire and you hope you become a soldier. You wouldnt disgrace yourself. Well, he had a lot of tests that. He survived. One of them was at the intersection at town. And i want to end my remarks with a little clip from it tipper and. I want you to think about what tipper, as you begin this wonderful program. Kerry, tipper is here, i hope, somewhere and there she is right there, ed and i and his wife, kerry, was at one of those events we did events here with you, ambrose, the pebble beach and up in the mountains, the north carolina. Wonderful, wonderful and inspired is one of those who inspired the actors that played the roles of the men of easy company. And you guys are going to be talking about this for the next day or two as the more interested. Is there anything good you can tell me about sobel. They said no. Berkeley said no. But it saved my life. So hows that . He said all he could do. That man can only could run. He could run. He to death up there to go, ran, ran, ran, ran back. He says if never been the conditioning i was in, i never would survive. That blasted karen time and made it to the beach. So thats the best i could say. Lets lets hear from ed, the night of the invasion. Yo, go out to the airfield. Whats whats going on before you all get in the plane . Whats going on after you get in the plane . Well, they gave us a last meal, like a condemned prisoner that, you know, i think we had turkeys after, indiana. We had ice cream machine over that for a couple of years and but we took all that in stride. We joked about it. The main thing i just cant stress too much. We were so confident that we were the best people in the world. We could take on the germans. I dont care what reputation that we were going to be successful, probably respected, high casualty, but we were willing take that we were reduced for totally. We could not be better prepared. Our training was over that that proved be true. When we dropped we were dropped. Total chaos the pilots flying our planes were not combat pilots all air transport pilot