JOHNNY SHEETZ DISPLAYS THE LETTER HE RECEIVED FROM VIETNAM VETERAN BILL CHAPIN. Before winter break, students in Barbara Hamilton’s English classes at Mariposa Middle School composed letters to veterans to thank them for their service to the country and wish them a merry Christmas. What some got in return was a priceless, first-hand account of history.

The letters were a culminations of a unit. Hamilton’s students had read two stories about Vietnam and viewed films about the war. Writing personal letters is part of the curriculum that helps meet the California state standards for language arts.

The highlight of the unit, however, was to make students aware of the sacrifice veterans made and increase empathy for those returning from war. Letters went all over the country, and one student received a two-page letter in response all the way from Florida.

The letters asked many questions ranging from if the soldiers volunteered or were drafted to how he slept at night. Students wanted to know if the veterans had lost friends in the war and if there were any good times.

STUDENTS AT MARIPOSA MIDDLE SCHOOL RECENTLY WROTE LETTERS TO VETERANS AND SOME GOT RESPONSES. THEY ALSO DID RESEARCH ON THE VIETNAM WAR AND WORLD WAR II AND CREATED THESE POSTERS. All the letters offered gratitude for their service. “Thank you for fighting for our land and lives,” Destiny Skains wrote.

“You must have been very brave, and you are a true war hero,” Katerina Breish said in her letter.

“I believe that if it were not for your courage, we might not have the freedom we have now,” Fayth Baars wrote. “I am glad you get to feel the greatness you fought for.”

The response letters came from near and far. Mariposa resident Bob Stonum called the letter from his student “just about the nicest Christmas gift that I received.” He told her, “On reflection, it was all worthwhile when we realize that you have the freedom to study and learn to be anything you want to be. The only limit is what you place on yourself.”

Other responses gave firsthand accounts of the war. Jonathan Turner told his letter writer it was hard being at war. “I was an interrogator and sometimes I had to say and do things that bothered me later on in life. But I knew had to do them at the time.” Turner served in the US Army in Vietnam for one year.

Bailey Gibson’s letter hit home for Jeff Hamilton, who remembered how difficult it was to return from Vietnam in 1967. “I returned home and in seeing the turmoil and protests of the war effort, I felt no pride in what my country had sent me to do,” he wrote. “That is why your letter was so important to me, because no one, except for my family members, ever specifically thanked me for the service that I rendered to my country.”

Several students talked about their letters and responses. Natalie Marquez, Dillon Aker-James and Ross Williams each got letters back from their veteran pen-pals.

Baars said she had told the veteran she wrote to that her grandfather had been a helicopter mechanic in the Vietnam war. When he wrote back, he told her that her grandfather likely saved his life, as he was a gunner on the ground.

Williams and Aker-James received responses from Bill Boyd of Mariposa who served in the Navy during World War II. Both were surprised to get a response.

Williams said Boyd told him the letter “made his new year.” If he got to talk with Boyd personally, Williams said he would thank him for his service. Aker-James said that the sacrifices of Boyd and others “made us free.”

All the students came away with poignant reflections on war. Baars said her respondent told her it was the first time he had ever been thanked. “They helped so much,” she said of the soldiers. “They really deserve the thanks.”

They realize that a whole new set of veterans is returning home from war today, and although things are different, the veterans share common experiences.

“They’re both fighting for freedom,” Marquez said of the different generations of soldiers. “They were fighting for the same thing.”

Marquez concluded, “No war is easy.”