Islander's documentary on local war hero to appear on WNED-TV

By Alice Gerard

Senior Contributing Writer

On June 9, 1944, Islander Charles N. DeGlopper, 22, was killed in a ferocious firefight at a bridge over the Merderet River at the village of La Fière, in Normandy, France.

Shortly before D-Day, DeGlopper, a member of the 325^th Glider Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army’s 82^nd Airborne Division, was training for the invasion, along with approximately half a million members of the U.S. military. While there, DeGlopper and his lifelong friend, the late Harold “Bud” Long, had a chance to catch up with each other.

According to an interview with Long, published in the Dispatch in October 2022, DeGlopper sensed his upcoming mission would be his last: “When we met there, maybe for a day or so, he said, ‘Bud, I’m not going to make it home.’ I said, ‘Charlie, we only have one more to go, and we’re going to be home.’ ”

Eighty years have passed since DeGlopper was killed. As of last year, according to the National World War II Museum, approximately 119,000 World War II veterans are still alive. The youngest of them are in their late 90s. That represents a small fraction of the approximately 16 million Americans who served in the armed forces during World War II.

“Not all that many people know about Charlie these days and what he did,” said Jerry Cahill, a filmmaker and a Grand Island native. Cahill, who worked for CBS Entertainment in Hollywood for 20 years and then for a CBS affiliate state in San Francisco for 10 years, recently produced a documentary about DeGlopper, titled “Charles N. DeGlopper: An American Hero.” The documentary will be televised at 9 p.m. Nov. 11 on WNED-TV/PBS.

At DeGlopper’s final resting place in Maple Grove Cemetery on Stony Point Road, there is an historical marker in honor of the Medal of Honor recipient. DeGlopper is also honored at a memorial park at Grand Island Boulevard and Baseline Road.

“The American Legion purchased the land between Baseline Road and Grand Island Boulevard and created the memorial Park there,” Cahill said. “A few years later, they commissioned the statue of Charlie to forever stand guard over it, with his rifle ever ready for action.”

That bronze statue was designed by Youngstown sculptor Susan Geissler in 2021.

“The DeGlopper Memorial sits where it should be, right in the heart of Grand Island,” Cahill said. “Where everyone can see it, walk through it, touch it. And when you do, you can actually feel the tragedy and the glory that is there among those memorial stones and the photographs of all the fallen from Grand Island, who met their destiny on some foreign location, defending their friends and comrades when they were needed the most.

“But most young people these days have no idea of what it all means. They don't know the story behind it and many really don't care. That's what the veterans' organizations, the VFW and the American Legion, are all about, remembering all those boys and girls, who have given all they could give, to preserve our freedom and the democratic institutions we all live by.

“It's been 80 years since Charlie died in that awful fire fight in a foreign land, and now it's our turn to remember him, and all those like him who have similarly given their lives to save their friends, and ultimately all of us, in all the wars in which our nation has sent our troops into harm's way.”

Memorials for DeGlopper also include a monument in France, not far from where he was killed, as well as at a dedicated exhibit in the Airborne Museum at Sainte-Mère-Église, France.

The documentary came about as the result of a request, Cahill said.

“My old school buddy, John Braddell, who belongs to the VFW here on Grand Island, approached me last spring to (produce) a documentary on Charlie DeGlopper as a fundraiser for the VFW and the American Legion,” he explained. “I am a proud member of the Legion, and I was itching to get into another good project, so I jumped at the chance.

“Charlie DeGlopper was one of the major World War II heroes. In the middle of the D-Day campaign in France, he made a one-man stand against an overwhelming German counterattack that would have wiped out his entire unit and threatened to push the American forces landing on Utah Beach, back into the sea. Charlie was a young farm boy from Grand Island, and he stood up in the middle of a bridge with his automatic rifle and poured so much fire into them that they couldn't get across the bridge, until at last he was killed. For that action, he won the Medal of Honor. He gave his life that day, but saved every man in his company, and gave the Allies the opportunity to advance into France and on to victory in World War II.

“That's why I took this film on, and, for me, it's been a very enriching experience. It was a lot of hard work, finding all the footage, writing, recording, editing and meeting some very extraordinary individuals who are a part of this story, from older veterans of Charlie's war to people involved in our own modern-day defense. The story is a great one, and putting this show together was for me a singular honor. I hope it will be successful, that especially young people will learn and appreciate all that their parents and their grandparents and their great-grandparents went through to pass this great gift along to them and to their children.”

For Cahill, the project was part of a homeward journey.

“My whole family was from around here, and I knew I could actually afford to live fairly well here on just my retirement income, so my wife, Bonnie, and I came back home to the Island,” he said. “I enjoy working in films and TV. I like the creativity and the art of filmmaking, whether it be for theatrical films or for TV. The work is very much the same, and I love it. I finally decided that the time had come, and I needed to take a step back and retire. But, because I'm really a lazy guy at heart, I couldn't actually retire in California. It's way too expensive there. That's why you don't find a lot of ex-filmmakers living there. They either work until they drop or they move away to a more retirement-friendly place.

“But I still like to keep my hand in ‘the business,’ so I do occasional theater shows and short movies. Two years ago, I produced a short documentary here called 'Living Water,’ telling the story of how pollution has grown to become a problem in the Niagara River. It was entered into several international film festivals, and it did very well, winning several prestigious awards.”

During his career, Cahill worked on a number of well-known television shows.

“I worked mostly on the primetime shows of the time: ‘Dallas,’ ‘The Dukes of Hazzard’ and ‘Knots Landing,’ along with several of the movies of the week of that time,” he said. “I did a lot of movie trailers and main titles, along with on-air promotion for all the CBS primetime lineup shows. I produced a behind-the-scenes documentary for the CBS miniseries, ‘Return to Lonesome Dove,’ along with all the ‘Lonesome Dove’ film promotions for CBS On Air.”

Cahill won an Emmy Award for a documentary he produced for the CBS affiliate state in San Francisco, titled “A Journey of Purpose,” chronicling a three-day bike ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles, as a fundraiser to help in AIDS research.

“When I left CBS, I worked freelance for several years, winning several Telly awards and Emmy nominations for several different shows I did up there, one of which was for a series that I worked on for NBC called ‘The Real Deal’; another was for another documentary called ‘To Save Your Life,’ which was really what we'd call a ‘backdoor pilot’ for another series of the same name,” he noted.

Cahill said he has many people to thank for “making this film happen.” They include executive producers John Braddell, Dale Berger (VFW post commander) and Ray DeGlopper (American Legion post commander), as well as Bob Lamb, who “wrote the script and the magazine article that our story is based on.” He also expressed gratitude to his wife, Bonnie, as well as to Kris DeGlopper Banks, Gary Roesch, Kelly Carrig, Paul Sommer and Henry Ensminger – all vital members of the VFW/American Legion film production committee.

“Without the help and support of all these people this could never have gotten done.”