Real-life heroes

Most debates, discussions, arguments or wars have two valid sides. Sure, I tend to think one side is more valid than the other, though the opposite viewpoint could theoretically be defended. But there have been a few historical eras where one side was absolutely in the wrong. And the people who stood up to that side were really and truly heroes in every sense of the word.

I'm speaking, of course, of the Nazis. My grandfathers were two remarkable heroes, as I am reminded whenever Veteran's Day rolls around, or WWII Vets are remembered in the paper for some reason or another, or it's my Grandpa's birthday, or veterans/Third Reichs/old people/grandfathers/etc. come up in conversation. I'm indescribably proud of both of them.

Another real hero was Miep Gies, who passed away this week. She was the last surviving member of the group that hid Anne Frank and her family in the now-famous annex above Otto Frank's business. Mrs. Gies was the woman who discovered and saved the pages of Anne's diary, the woman who also hid an anti-Nazi university student in her home, and the woman who tried to bargain with the Gestapo for the Franks' lives.

I have been to the Anne Frank House museum in Amsterdam. Near the end of the tour I stood away from the group and cried. It was so powerful, so illustrative of the absolute right that was the Allies' stand against Hitler's Germany. The generation of men and women who took that stand, who defended right against wrong - the Greatest Generation - is aging. Every day we lose another real hero. Have we sufficiently documented their stories? How can instill reverence, and true understanding of the sacrifices they made, in our children? Will there ever be another group so deserving en masse of respect?