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“Love your Freedom, because that’s what we fought for”—D-Day Gunner’s Mate Frank DeVita
—“DeVita, drop the ramp!” For a few seconds I froze, because I knew when I dropped that ramp, the machine gun bullets will come into the boat. And then for the third time he yelled, punctuated with colorful profanity and I dropped the ramp. The bullets that were hitting the ramp came into the boat.
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Coast Guard pioneers the marine radio over 100 years ago!
—On Aug. 23, 1899, the terse message: “Sherman is sighted,” announced the return of the troopship after the Spanish-American War. Transmitted from Lightship 70, this message was the first wireless ship-to-shore telegraph message in U.S. history.