Despite sporadic audio and air-conditioning problems, hundreds thronged the Memory Tent and hung on every word of the speakers who told their stories from World War II.

Roy Johnston, a World War II veteran from Lawrence who served as an Army infantryman in the South Pacific and Europe, said listening to the stories helped him gain a greater understanding of the war effort.

“I feel like I’m being brought up to date, getting a fuller picture on what others were doing in the war,” he said.

He especially enjoyed the discussion of two American Indians who were code-talkers. “I heard for a long time that they weren’t recognized, just like the Buffalo soldiers,” he said.

Bruce Eighmey, a former school teacher from Kansas City, Kan., said the firsthand accounts from war veterans provided information about the war one couldn’t learn from television or movies.

He said the racial obstacles the Tuskegee Airmen had to overcome “should be taught in high school.”

And the bravery of Doolittle’s Raiders, who took off on a bombing run knowing they would probably not have enough fuel to get to safety, was inspiring, he said.

“This has got to be the highlight” of the events surrounding the dedication of the Dole Institute of Politics, Eighmey said.

Bill Perich, of Atchison, tried to get his camera to work to get a photograph taken with Walter Ehlers, who was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions in the invasion of Normandy on D-Day.

“These guys are my heroes,” said Perich, who remembers as a child collecting scrap for the war effort to help the soldiers.

Dan Keener drove from Rush Center in western Kansas, and he said he wished his father, a World War II veteran, was alive to see and hear the talks. “They’re unbelievable, very stimulating,” he said of the programs.

June Cooper, a former campaign worker for Bob Dole and now a Republican National committeewoman from Garnett, said she was happy to see so many young people listening to the stories of the veterans. “It just warms my heart to see them out here.”

Robert Conroy, a retired doctor and Vietnam-era veteran from Topeka, said the discussions reminded him of the horrors of war.

“I’ll never forget the war casualties. It brings home the reality of war like no other way,” he said.

Samuel Billison, one of the code talkers who spoke to the group, cracked several jokes. But when he started to talk about the fighting he experienced at Iwo Jima, he said he couldn’t speak about it.

Ogden Lindsley of Stull, a retired KU professor who had been shot down, taken prisoner by the Germans and then escaped, tried to attend the Memory Tent events but said he wasn’t able to hear the speakers.

The celebration of war heroes, he said, didn’t increase his memories of the war.

“The war has always been with me,” he said. “At one time, I’d think of it all the time, once I counted 60 times a day. Now, it’s maybe two or three times a day.”