Montowese Elementary School honored local veterans this week with a luncheon and opportunity to speak with the students about their experiences.

The event was conceived by Vietnam War veteran and Montowese fifth grade teacher Steven Wronski. In addition to 35 veterans, representing conflicts from World War II through the present, the event was attended by State Rep. Steve Fontana (D-North Haven), State Sen. Len Fasano (R-North Haven), and First Selectman-elect Michael Freda.

The luncheon, hosted by Montowese special education paraprofessional Jane Dineen, featured an overabundance of donated food. The surplus represented the generosity of the school staff and local restaurants.

“A lot of the staff baked for me,” Dineen said. “I asked Luigi’s for three loaves of bread, and they gave me eight loaves and two pizzas.”

One square Luigi’s pizza was decorated like the American flag, complete with stripes and “God Bless Our Vets” composed in cheese. Other local vendors also donated more than what was requested. “The response was overwhelming,” Dineen said. “Nobody said ‘no,’ and it’s a tough time with the economy.”

As the veterans dined and shared stories, Montowese fifth graders handed out cards handmade by Clintonville School’s first graders. Inside each illustrated card was the message “Dear veteran, thank you for keeping our country safe.” After the meal, the dignitaries and Montowese principal Anthony Mancini, whose father attended the event as a World War II naval veteran, applauded the guests.

“Thank you for your services and what you did for America,” the principal said. “I know that a number of you would say ‘let me loose and I’ll go back to serve my country.’”

Mancini vowed to maintain the event, even as he and Wronski are retiring this year, and Dineen is slated to be promoted to a different building. “We will work together to form a committee to make sure that what we do here for Flag Day and Veterans Day continues,” Mancini said.

Veteran and Connecticut American Legion Commander Charlie Morrissey commended the school for the event. “I’ve been all over the state, and this is one of the better programs involving veterans,” he said.

Fasano spoke of a veteran who lectured Wallingford elementary students a day before. “He was trying to explain to the kids what it meant to be a veteran,” the state senator said. “He got halfway through his speech and he broke down into tears. He had been speaking of camaraderie and the people who served in the war with him.”

“He was unable to complete the speech, and he apologized to the kids,” Fasano continued. “But to me, that means more to what it is to be a veteran than any word he said.”

Fontana said that during lunch, he learned that the phrase “the whole nine yards” was a World War II allusion to firing off the whole nine yards of an aircraft machinegun ammunition belt.

“Thank you for coming in and sharing you experiences with the kids,” the state representative said. “For me, that’s what this is all about - sharing. Today I learned what to ‘go the whole nine yards’ meant. Well, thanks to all of you for going the whole nine yards.”

Freda too was thankful for the veterans’ recollections. “Each and every one of you is an individual history book of stories and experiences,” he said. “People like me are truly interested in your experiences. The saddest part is that when veterans pass away every day across the U.S., another history book is closed.”

The history books included former North Haven selectman Howard Luppi and former First Selectman Walter Gawrych. The latter stormed the beaches of Iwo Jima in World War II as a 19 year old.

“We were so backed up into each other,” Gawrych said of the storming. “The enemy artillery in the mountains simply had to aim for the beach. Anywhere they hit would be casualties.”

“We captured half a mile in five days,” he added. “We never realized that the enemy was underground. In your foxholes, you could hear noises underground at night. That’s when they would come out and pull their kamikazes. That’s the way it was.”

Gawrych was to be part of the mainland Japanese invasion force that was halted by the atomic bombs. Afterward, his division entered the country and raised the first American flag to fly over Nagasaki, just 28 days after the bombing.

“There was a circumference of devastation after the atomic bomb,” Gawrych said, “and right beyond the circumference was untouched. There was a lot of ash, and a lot of people on the peripheral had physical damage to their self being.”

Fellow World War II veteran Charles Theriault flew 30 missions in a B-17 bomber over Germany, serving as a top turret gunner. He was present for the one of the Nazi’s few attempts at kamikaze aircraft.

“The Germans would ram our bombers with a fighter plane,” he said. “These were young Germans – 15 to 17 years old – and they were sacrificing one person to kill 10. We called it ‘ram-a-jerking.’”

When asked how he survived such an effective attack, Theriault turned to luck. “They just never hit me,” he said. “They always hit somebody else.”

Clifton Hartman of Cheshire defused bombs, mines, and booby traps in World War II. “I would clear the mines before the infantry came in,” he said. “I served in 12 countries all over the Mediterranean.”

Hartman met both General George S. Patton and General Dwight D. Eisenhower during the war, and even cleared a villa for the latter in Tunisia. “Eisenhower had picked out a villa for meetings and asked me to go through the building to see if it was booby trapped,” Hartman said. “There were no booby traps, but there was live ammunition that I had to remove. I had to be able to do everything.”

After the luncheon, the veterans, clothed in brown and blue military uniforms and caps, fanned out among classrooms of second to fifth graders. Before World War II Air Force veteran Walter Husnak spoke to Chris Horton’s fifth grade class, the teacher gave him an emotional introduction.

“This man had to leave behind a very young wife, who didn’t know if he would be coming back alive or in a box,” Horton said through tears. “That was very hard to do.”

Husnak explained that as a 19-year-old, he flew in B-22 Liberator bombers in the Pacific, 5,000 miles from the U.S. With picture aids, he vividly recast his bomber’s 20 and 50 caliber machineguns, its bay loaded with 40 bombs, and the deadly Japanese Zero fighter planes. Husnak also put on a genuine, World War II oxygen mask and life jacket.

World War II Air Force veteran Dominic Santoro told another class of fifth graders that camaraderie helped him survive war. “I served two-and-a-half years overseas with a wonderful group of guys,” he said. “We all pitched in and made life more bearable for each other.”

In the same classroom, a student asked Theriault what he ate in war. “Dried milk, dried eggs, mostly dried food,” he said with a laugh. “The food was awful.”

Lou Celentano, veteran of the 825th tank destroyer battalion in World War II, recounted to a fourth grade class how he destroyed four German Tiger tanks in the Battle of the Bulge. Afterward, a student asked him if he was nervous during combat.

“You were nervous before a big battle, but once you started to do your work, the nervousness went away,” Celentano said. “But it would come back afterwards. You would shake heavily and you wouldn’t know why.”

The veterans who spoke at Montowese served to bridge the gap between pictures and descriptions in students’ text books and the real wars they fought in defending the country. The veterans also brought an important lesson to the children about their own futures.

“When I was your age and I went to school, a gentleman would come into my class,” Santoro said to his classroom. “His name was Mr. Norfolk. He was a Civil War veteran. Now I’m a World War II veteran talking to you. And I’m wondering, 65 years from now, how many of you might be standing before a class and talking about how you’re a veteran. History repeats itself.”