After only a week of retirement, John Klein returned to work for one day at The Cobb School, Montessori in Simsbury. Adults and children alike were thrilled to see John Klein, former custodian, walk the halls this Monday morning.
In honor of Veteran’s Day, John Klein, Specialist E4 Radio Operator in the Vietnam War, spoke to Cobb School elementary classes. John held his audiences captive as he told stories from his difficult days in 1968 and 1969.
John shared details to capture each child’s attention. How intriguing the landscape, culture and wildlife were. How the soldiers ate meal after meal from tin cans stored in wooden boxes. How men’s shirts cracked from the heat and ripped right down their backs. How mosquitoes were so brutal soldiers slept with shirts pulled over their heads. How men grabbed their soap to wash in the rain. How soldiers spent years sleep-deprived and scared.
And how he learned, “You can’t be brave until you’re terrified.”
“I wanted to do my part,” John Klein told Cobb students. He explained how he came from a long line of soldiers -- his grandfather in World War I, his father in World War II. When John turned 19 he volunteered for for the US Army and headed to 8 weeks of basic training, then 8 weeks of radio school before assuming his role atop a tank, a M16 before him.
Although John declared, “I was proud that I served,” he also told the children, “War is the dumbest thing we do as a species.” John delicately answered the children’s questions about ambushes, enemies, combat and weaponry, and just as delicately steered the discussion back to his central message: “No one should ever have to experience war.”
