Latest news with #UniversityofWestGeorgia
Yahoo
27-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
GA salvage worker finds WWII vet's Purple Heart in junk pile. Here's the journey to return it
It almost sounds like something out of a movie. A WWII veteran's Purple Heart, gone for decades, was recently found in Newnan, in a junk heap. A salvage worker ran across the medal after the case containing it got lodged under the seat of his forklift. Inscribed on the medal was the name 'David T. McMahon.' Purple Hearts are given to U.S. service members who are injured or killed in the line of duty. Realizing the significance of the medal, that worker took it to the Newnan VFW to see if they could help track down the owner. That's where Steve Quesinberry steps in. Quesinberry is a history professor at the University of West Georgia in Coweta County, and has also published a book documenting veterans who died in Coweta County in the Vietnam War. 'I've tracked down a lot of family members and friends to try to get their story, because I was afraid those guys were going to be forgotten,' Quesinberry told Michigan Live. 'For some of them, they were forgotten, and it took me a long time to dig stuff up about their life.' Quesinberry started doing what he does best: researching. According to records he found, McMahon was originally born in New York and moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan. TRENDING STORIES: Severe storm threat moving through late tonight 'I'm scared:' Family seeks answers after missing pregnant woman walks away from Atlanta hospital Man accused of gunning down Georgia Tech student in targeted shooting has turned himself in He went to school there and eventually enrolled in the U.S. Army two months after Pearl Harbor. 'It sounds like he was one of those guys who heard about Pearl Harbor and said, 'I'm dropping whatever I'm doing and joining the military,'' Quesinberry said. McMahon was eventually stationed in the Philippines at the time of his death. McMahon's fighter plane inexplicably crashed while taking off on Jan. 26, 1945. He died from injuries three days later. Quesinberry told the newspaper that he didn't find any local relatives here in Georgia but did find an article about McMahon in the Grand Rapids Press, where his parents' names were listed. Using that article, Quesinberry was able to track down McMahon's last living relative, a 77-year-old niece living in California named Lee Colodzin. Colodzin said her parents didn't talk much about her uncle, other than that he died in WWII. Colodzin's parents died when she was 19, and her brother was 14, the newspaper said. 'I think it was back in the age when people compartmentalized themselves and didn't talk about things that hurt,' Colodzin said. 'Even though I never met my uncle, this has brought up a lot of emotion for me; thinking about him and thinking about my mother, who lost her favorite brother.' Quesinberry said the Newnan VFW is making plans to send the medal to California so Colodzin can have it. And now with the medal heading to a family member, how it ended up in junk heap in Newnan remains a eventually
Yahoo
09-04-2025
- Yahoo
Experts highlight services available to crime victims in Georgia
The Brief This week is National Crime Victims' Rights Week. The initiative began in 1981. This year's theme is Kinship, Connecting & Healing. It's a call to action to recognize that shared humanity should be at the center of supporting all survivors and victims of crime. CARROLLTON, Ga. - It is National Crime Victims' Rights Week. The University of West Georgia played host to an event featuring, among others, the Georgia Office of Victim Services, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, and the Child Advocacy Center. The backstory The University of West Georgia played host to a National Crime Victims' Rights Week event. It featured, among others, the Georgia Office of Victim Services, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the Child Advocacy Center, and crime survivors. Participants shared best practices on how to better advocate for crime victims. Those involved also discussed how more needs to be done to educate crime victims about their rights and the services available to them pre-trial, during trial, and after adjudication. What they're saying Keir Chapple, the director of the Georgia Office of Victim Services, believes many people, especially, are not aware of services available to them after a conviction. "To receive reimbursement for certain expenses for being a victim," said Keir Chapple. "Losing income, even getting reimbursement for therapy, are things people are not always aware of." The Victim Offender Dialogue program provides counseling and a safe environment for victims to ask questions of their offenders. It's a program Belgicia Howell-Cowart credits with bringing closure and healing for her. In 1997, her ex-boyfriend of six months beat, stabbed, and raped her. The man pled guilty, but a decade later she had a chance to meet with her attacker one-on-one via the VOD initiative. Howell-Cowart requested the conversation be had with guards but without the offender being shackled. "That program gave me the ability to have that strength, not be afraid of him," recalled Howell-Cowart. "I got all the answers I needed." What's next You can learn more about some of the services available to victims by going to the State Board of Pardons and Paroles. The Source FOX 5's Kevyn Stewart spoke with Keir Chapple, the director of the Georgia Office of Victim Services, and those impacted by the services for this article.
Wall Street Journal
28-03-2025
- Politics
- Wall Street Journal
‘Shots Heard Round the World' Review: America's Transatlantic Revolution
The American Revolution pitted colonists against the British Empire in a struggle that resembled David's stand against Goliath, but it also became a global war in which Britain defied an allied coalition alone. In his international history of the Revolutionary War written for the 250th anniversary of its outbreak, John Ferling brings Europe and its rivalries into the familiar story of American independence. With 'Shots Heard Round the World,' Mr. Ferling, a professor emeritus of history at the University of West Georgia, shows not only why nations fought but also how they waged a protracted struggle whose outcome remained in doubt to the end. Foreign assistance was critical in what the author calls 'America's longest war before the Vietnam conflict.' Absolutist monarchs in France and Spain aided rebellious Americans, and the unruly colonists eagerly looked to them for help. The explanations for this odd coupling lie in the earlier Seven Years' War (1756-63). Britain had won a victory at stupendous financial cost, which prompted its efforts to tax and regulate the colonies. Americans, free of danger on their frontiers, now defied encroachments on their self-government by the mother country. Many colonists, as Mr. Ferling notes, believed France would give help in any confrontation. Indeed, after France and Spain's humiliating defeat, the two empires set out on a path to revenge. British victory had disrupted the balance of power beyond Europe in ways that irked other powers. Noting Britain's insults to France, the Comte de Vergennes, who advised Louis XVI on foreign policy, described the empire as 'greedy, restless, [and] more jealous of the prosperity of its neighbors than awake to its own happiness.' Spain felt its American colonies were threatened by Britain's increased power in the New World, and other European states resented how Britain used dominance at sea against their trade. Ruling the waves allowed Britannia to waive the rules for its own advantage. The tyranny of what Austria's emperor, Joseph II, called British 'despotism at sea' grated on Europe as much as taxation or regulation did on the colonies. Britain, for its part, saw America as essential to its prosperity. Losing the mainland colonies, many believed, would create a domino effect, costing it the West Indies and then Ireland. This assumption fueled intransigence among ministers and George III, who believed concession brought more defiance. The decision to punish Massachusetts for the Boston Tea Party in 1773 began an escalating cycle that led to the shots fired at Lexington and Concord in April 1775. A colonial rebellion quickly turned into a civil war across British America. To defeat and dismantle the regime that the Continental Congress and the Patriots had established, large-scale action would be required. George III had already told his prime minister, Lord North, that 'blows must decide' how the quarrel would end.
