General Assembly of 9th November 2019

 

Dear friends 

 

1 – We proceeded with election of new members of the board :
 Mr Pierre Deschamps, Miss Andgie Demoncy, Mr Nicolas Lequertier, Mr Philippe Nekrassof were elected.
Reelected Mrs Corinne Lefevre 

Board directors :

  • President: Maurice Renaud  reelected
  • 1st Vice President: Any Saint Martin reelected
  • 2nd Vice President: Barthelemy Ballester elected
  • Treasurer: Barthelemy Ballester reelected
  • Secretary: Louisette Leducq reelected

 

2 – We are very pleased with the 75th D Day AVA events. 

We consider that it was a great success and it will be hard to do better in the future.
We organised, thanks to Any Saint Martin, 260 invitations for dinner with local families for the troups. More than ever.

June 6 – The Memorial service was brilliant and moving.
The ceremonies at the Alexandre Renaud and Airborne monuments were attended by huge crowds. The Gold Star Mother plaque for Simone Renaud was unveiled by the VIPs. The 82nd color guard  attended all our ceremonies.

The presence of General Mark Milley, MG James Mingus (82nd), MG Brian Winski (101st) was a great honor for us. General Milley was welcomed as a rock star in the streets of the town after his powerful speech. 

We were very pleased also to get Prince Albert II of Monaco attending as well as Mrs Susan Eisenhower, the 3 daughters of General James Maurice Gavin, Mrs Helen Patton.

This was followed by a cocktail party at the city hall enjoyed by everyone with the Ladies for Liberty of Louisville KY singing, the band of Brothers jazz band from Holland and the All American Airborne chorus of the 82nd .

Prince Albert II of Monaco was made honorary member of the AVA association on that occasion.

 

June 7 – The banquet with near 1100 attending, was a huge success.
Lots of dignitaries, American and French, attended, among them Mr John C. Rood, under  Secretay​ of Defense at the Pentagon, and a large group from the American Legion. A dynamic entertainment was provided including the always very popular All Airborne chorus of the 82nd .

We had a unique participation of 40 native American Indians Veterans. A group organised by Mrs Marie Pascale Legrand and led by Veteran combat nurse Charles Shay who was in the early hours of June 6 1944 on the beach of Omaha doing his best to save lives of  wounded  soldiers. Incredible that he survived !

 

June 8 – In the afternoon in the streets of the town there was an incredible show of 3000 musicians.
Groups coming from 15 different US States ! A huge musical parade.

In the morning at the Airborne museum we organised a commemoration of General / President Dwight Eisenhower. The ceremony was very meaningful and Mrs Susan Eisenhower delivered a most interesting speech.

 

June 9 – La Fiere
1300 parachute jumps. With more than 30 planes including a bunch of vintage C 47, the French Air Force patrol, the Breitling acrobatic patrol. A full show !

Many Veterans attending. A record crowd estimated to more than 120.000 people was watching. We had never seen so many people.

In the afternoon we dedicated the beautiful and large plaque in tribute to General James Maurice Gavin (you can look at the plaque of General Gavin on this website). The 3 daughters of General Gavin were present with their families. A total of 38 wreaths were laid ! The military parade and the ceremony were outstanding.

You can watch the ceremony on the videos posted on this website.

I wish to express our gratitude to the donors who helped us to finance this well deserved project in memory of General Gavin.

After these days few of us deserved a good rest.

 

76th D DAY  PROGRAM

June 2 – Dinner with local families for US soldiers 

June 4 – 16h00 Ceremony at Alexandre Renaud monument

              16h30 Memorial Service 

              17h30 Ceremony monument Airborne  AVA

              18h00 Cocktail party at city hall

June 5 – 19h00 AVA banquet of Liberty 

               Rates: 30 usd per person for AVA members 

                            45 usd for non members 

Membership yearly fee 12 usd ( unchanged )

Payment can be made using the Paypal button on our website. 

Plenty of pictures and videos of the 75th to watch on the website 

 

You can order USB key with 3 hours of our videos of 75th D Day. Price 20 usd including postage

June 6 – LA FIERE parachute in the morning. Ceremony at Iron Mike in afternoon

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NEW PROJECT – Life size statues of General Eisenhower and General Roosevelt 

Mrs Cathy Soref of Locust Valley, Long Island, honorary president of Operation Democracy initiated this project. The plan is to get life size statues made by an artist in the States. The Eisenhower statue would be delivered and unveiled in Sainte Mere Eglise on the square in 2021. The Roosevelt statue would arrive in 2022 at a location near the Airborne museum.

Mrs Soref is working on the financing of this project with the help of the American Legion (Gen Roosevelt was a founder of the American Legion) and other channels.

Interesting point: these bronze statues will be manufactured with pieces of metal coming from the Statue of Liberty when it was  repaired several years ago.

 

The AVA association

Maurice RENAUD 

 

 

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