This combination photo of images released by William Morrow show "All the Gallant Men: An American Sailor's Firsthand Account of Pearl Harbor," by Donald Stratton with Ken Gire, left, and "Never Call Me a Hero: A Legendary American Dive-Bomber Pilot Remembers the Battle of Midway," by N. Jack "Dusty" Kleiss and Timothy Orr. (William Morrow via AP)
October 03, 2017 - 5:58 AM
NEW YORK - A recent wave of World War II memoirs may well be the last wave.
Even veterans who were teenagers when the war ended in 1945 are at or approaching 90 by now. The 75th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack came last December and publishers will likely have a hard time finding fresh accounts for the 75th anniversaries of milestones such as D-Day, June 6, 1944, and V-J Day, Aug. 14, 1945.
According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, some 558,000 World War II veterans are still alive, a fraction of the millions who survived the conflict. By the end of the decade, the number is expected to drop to under 300,000.
News from © The Associated Press, 2017