Encore of original from June 6, 2019.
If this looks familiar, it’s an encore of a Musings shared here two years ago … but I believe there’s a fair number of current readers who were not yet on board two years ago.
While perhaps not on the level of Pearl Harbor or 9/11, this event in World War Two whose anniversary occurs this Sunday is one that’s not to be forgotten, if for no other reason than the number of American lives which were at stake in the battle! Code-named Operation Overlord, yet commonly known as the D-Day invasion of the Normandy coast of France, is when Allied forces began re-claiming the continent of Europe from Nazi domination.
With all that said, I want to share with you a unique piece of historical audio. Unless you were listening to XM Radio’s Savoy Express in June of 2004 or 2007, when we aired a minute-by-minute + 60 or 63 years re-creations of radio’s coverage of the first 40 hours of the Invasion utilizing the resources of the National Broadcasting Company, I doubt you’ve ever heard this 10-minute report.
It is the voice of the newspaper reporter who was on the ground that fateful morning, climbing the Normandy cliffs along with tens of thousands of brave troops from the United States, Great Britain and Canada. Of that number, more than 2,500 Americans gave their lives (originally projected by General Eisenhower and Allied leaders as very possibly being as much as ten times that amount), and an even larger number were severely wounded … of those, the greatest number were part of the first wave to hit the beaches … until brave souls were able to quiet the machine guns situated in German bunkers at the top of the cliffs.
Shown here is a copy of the NBC log, maintained by a clerk typing on both sides of 5 X 8 index cards, documenting minute-by-minute what was broadcast on their flagship station, WEAF in New York City as well as being fed down the line to all affiliates across the nation. This portion of the documentation covers late morning of D-Day + 1, June 7th, 1944, with this report beginning at 11:46 AM Eastern War Time.
The reporter, Tom Treanor, was not a broadcaster, rather a war correspondent and newspaper columnist for the Los Angeles Times, functioning as a pool reporter, meaning that any radio or print organization that was part of the “pool” group could utilize the reports. While being broadcast on June 7th from the Advanced Allied Command Post of the Invasion Forces located somewhere in southern England, what he describes is his experiences from 24 hours earlier while being involved with the thousands of troops landing on the beachheads and climbing the Normandy cliffs in the face of German gunfire and land mines under foot.
TWO NOTES:
1. Beware, as some of what he describes is quite graphic.
2. While the audio is from NBC in 1944, the visual creation is by my devoted webmaster, Trishah.
Tom Treanor was much-acclaimed for his reporting from the “heat of the battle.” Sadly, less than three months after D-Day, he would die from injuries suffered in a Jeep accident as he continued to cover the liberation of France. In an obituary it’s written: “Tom Treanor, if he had to die, died as a reporter should … The Times’ war correspondent never was one to sit in the back row and let the news come to him. He went out to meet it … Drama and human interest were his wares … Danger, in fact, seemed to act as a stimulant upon his reporting ability.”
This drawing was published along with his obituary on August 22, 1944, just days after his death on the battlefield. While I don’t have confirmation, it’s presumed that both appeared in his home paper, the Los Angeles Times. It appears here courtesy of ladailymirror.com. If don’t happen to be familiar with journalistic jargon, the term “30” signifies the end of the story.
The National D-Day Memorial is located in the small community of Bedford in southwestern Virginia. Why there? Because a National Guard unit headquartered in Bedford would be activated early in the War and end up being part of the first wave of troops to land on Omaha Beach on that fateful morning … resulting in 19 of that community’s young men dying – take a minute and read the story of the Bedford Boys!
As you watch, listen to broadcasts and read print articles related to this historic day which, while still with a year to go, was the beginning of the end of World War Two … solemnly remember the tens of thousands of young men who took part in this massive undertaking. While filled with fear and trepidation, they still courageously charged forward to fulfill to the best of their ability the mission with which they were tasked! That, of course, is restoring and retaining the freedoms that we Americans so treasure!
Image Credits: D-Day Normandy courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, Tom Treanor drawing courtesy of ladailymirror.com
Marlin,
My father was one of the last people to see Tom Treanor alive. See the Los Angeles Times Sunday October 1, 1994, page 17 for a full account. Tom gave my father a piece of invasion script with his signature promising that the editor of the LA Times would buy my father a couple of drinks. A few hours later Tom and his driver were killed.
Thanks for writing about this marvelous journalist.
Thank you, Wayne … appreciate knowing. To be honest, I didn’t know anything about Tom beyond hearing that one audio report in NBC Radio’s coverage of the D-Day invasion when I was creating our 40-hour special in 2004 … that is, until I began researching him for my Musings article.
FYI I wrote a biography of Tom Treanor, published in 2015 ("Dying for the News: Remembering Tom Treanor" etc. see Amazon) which is based in part on letters Treanor wrote back to his wife in L.A. while he was in Europe (obtained from his daughter Cordelia). Interesting stuff for WWII nerds.
Thanks for that information, Gary.
I never knew or did any research on him beyond what I heard on that audio recording, which is part of a set of audio CD’s taken from reference recordings of NBC’s coverage of the first 30+ hours of the D-Day invasion, beginning with the first bulletin aired on the network shortly after Midnight on June 6th, 1944.