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The Path and Impact of your Research

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Exploring our lives and those of our family members is an activity many people engage in today, often as genealogical or military research. Some explore their lives through various energetic and healing modalities. Most people tend to stay on one path – that of collecting facts (names, dates, and places.) These are entered in a family tree or notes for a project or book. Usually only information which is easy to obtain, or on the surface, is explored. Changing paths or going deeper into our life and those of our family members is often avoided. The path is often seen as a dangerous, dark, painful detour in life, that many choose to avoid.

Why is it most people do not go deeper in their research? Are they unaware of the infinite possibilities of understanding and healing available? Are they afraid to walk the other path, which will lead to greater understanding of themselves and their family members? Are they afraid to walk into the possibility of darkness emerging even when healing can occur?

Have you ever considered the true impact of researching the lives of your family members? Did you ever notice you may begin with one individual and move through the process or down the rabbit hole and end up in a place you never expected to be?

My family and military research has always started with the idea of researching one individual. It usually turns out that others will show up to guide the research and take me down the other path which contains the real story of what happened to them and the family. It is on that path the darkness often reveals itself and if I move through it, light and peace emerge at the end of the road. As I move through that darkness, the darkness long hidden in me often emerges and demands resolution. This has not been an easy process the last several years. I’ve gone through a lot of pain, tears, darkness, and loss of people in my life. I continue to come out of each dark period stronger, more confident, more understanding of the people in my life and myself. Healing takes place in ways it couldn’t otherwise.

I have had many clients who start a project focusing on one person – a father, brother, mother – who either died in World War II or returned home. They begin asking for the general service history of the individual. Maybe they have worked on their family history or they reached a point in their lives they want to know what really happened.

Through the course of research, I discuss findings with the client and ask questions. Often, the questions are more personal to help the client open up to a level of understanding of the individual in question, himself, the research, and how it affected the family, that otherwise may not occur. Through this process, he walks down a path of discovery and healing he never expected.

What happens when we follow the other path and the energy of a project? Who else shows up on our journey? Often it is someone we never expected and long deceased. Sometimes pain emerges from issues long put to rest, or so we think. Time has a way of healing, and also releasing the pain, exactly when we are ready to heal it.

Are you ready to walk the other path? Ask the more difficult questions? Move into the darkness so you can emerge again in the light? This fall I will be releasing new books and programs to help you do this. You may also experience the process by working with me on a client project. Contact me to find out what’s possible.

© 2017 World War II Research and Writing Center

New Service Available for Clients

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The World War II Research and Writing Center is now providing speech writing and speaking services for funerals, memorial programs, commemorations, and other military events. We have presented at the Ninth Infantry Division Association Reunion Memorial Service; 104th Infantry Division Pups Reunion Program; the Tilburg, Netherlands Liberation Ceremony in 2015; and in the Netherlands at Liberation Commemorations.

Contact us for information and fees for research, speaking, and writing services.

© 2017 World War II Research and Writing Center

Journaling to Heal the Past

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Journaling has been something I have been doing since I was a little girl. Not consistently though until the last few years. My early journals were typical of a girl moving into puberty, Jr. High and High School, with talk of which boy was the cutest, drama with friends and siblings, and my dreams for the future. In High School they became much more. An outlet to describe frustrations in my family life (typical teenager complaints), a safe place to explore the larger world and my gigantic dreams which were too large and out there for most people in my life. I’m sure most people who knew me then, thought I was crazy for having such big dreams and growing up in such a small town.

After I became an adult, the journals changed again as an even more safe place to talk about my fears, sadness, guilt, shame, mistakes, anger, and dreams. When I had my first child, miscarriages, and later twins, the journals became a place to express all I had before, adding marriage troubles, and my hopes and dreams for my children.

When I moved out in June 2012 to get divorced and start a new life, I had a relatively new and thriving business. The journals became a place to work through all the changes in my life, express my fears in being a single mother and business owner, channeling my relatives and guides as I transitioned into a more authentic version of who I was. They also became a place to create many things for my business, which shifted from genealogy to WWI and WWII research, speaking, and writing.

My journaling has been so intense the last several years, so vulnerable and open, that I have personally changed a great deal, as have those around me. As we heal ourselves, others heal too, even if we are unaware it is happening. I channel the soldiers when they show up asking for help. The research and writing, and even the programs I teach, heal the living and the dead.

The journals that have shown up and gifted to me since December are also full of magic. I ask them before I write in them, what do you want from me? The last journal I filled told me I had to be more open, honest, and vulnerable about everything and share the journal with my fiancé! That was a scary concept because I don’t share my journals. Yet I knew if I could be vulnerable and authentic, and share my writing with him, I would be able to share more of myself with the world when the time was right.

Do you know what happened when he read the journal? We both healed. I didn’t die of fright or shame or guilt over anything I wrote. He didn’t head for the hills and never speak to me again. The entire process allowed me to move into a place I had never been. A very good place.

We are all works in progress. As I shift more each day into a more authentic, aware version of myself, a healer, mother, soon to be wife, daughter, friend, business owner, the people entering my reality is shifting and changing. Clients are showing up asking for military research but also so much more. I’m hearing words and phrases:

I’m looking for answers, closure, peace, healing.

Words they put into their stories when we talk include: answers, closure, peace, healing, shame, guilt, fear, anger, love, trauma, PTSD, inherited trauma, resolution, secrets, pain, and many more.

I’m trying to understand WHO my father really was. Why our relationship was as it was. WHO I am after learning all this.

These secrets were kept for so long. What do I do with them? How do I resolve the past and understand?

Would you please write a summary of my dad’s service to be read at his military funeral?

At least a few of my new clients are journaling about their lives, families, trauma (both their own and inherited), and research on their family members. Some of them use journaling to understand the past to heal it and themselves. Others use it to also record their journey through the research, the questions and answers, and healing, in preparation to write a book or walk in Europe where their soldier walked (and often died.)

When we think of genealogical or military research, we often focus only on the research and adding information to our family tree. Too often we choose not to write anything. It becomes a single short fact in a tree or database.

What would happen if we had a journal dedicated to our research? A safe place to document our progress, questions, answers, hidden family secrets, and all the shame, guilt, anger, hate, and even LOVE that arises throughout the process?

Are you using journaling for your research? How has it helped you? What tips do you have for others who are ready to start this process of research and healing?

© 2017 World War II Research and Writing Center

Now Available! World War II Writing Prompts on Kindle

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The World War II Research and Writing Center is pleased to announce that both of our writing books now available on the Kindle.

Stories from the World War II Battlefield: World War II Writing Prompts

Product Description

Stories can save us. Stories have the power to heal. Stories help us preserve the past and provide hope that history will not repeat itself. For some cultures, storytelling is the primary method for transmitting a family or group’s collective history. For others, writing the stories to share with family or the world, is the method.

When we write, we must ask ourselves, what writing really matters? Consider the words you write as your legacy. Find ways to share your writing to document your life, to remember those who are no longer here, and to honor those who survived a time when the world was collapsing in chaos.

This important reference guide contains more than 500 writing prompts covering multiple themes for writers in the U.S. and overseas. Explore these prompts as you write your stories of war.

Stories from the World War II Battlefield: Volume 3 Writing the Stories of War

Product Description

Stories can save us. Stories have the power to heal. Stories help us preserve the past and provide hope that history will not repeat itself. For some cultures, storytelling is the primary method for transmitting a family or group’s collective history. For others, writing the stories to share with family or the world, is the method.

When we write, we must ask ourselves, what writing really matters? Consider the words you write as your legacy. Find ways to share your writing to document your life, to remember those who are no longer here, and to honor those who survived a time when the world was collapsing in chaos.

All the tools researchers need to start writing the stories of World War II from a U.S. perspective or overseas theater of war perspective, to honor those who lived in those chaotic years, are included in this volume.

The tools include:

  • Reasons to write the stories of war.
  • Tips to help you organize your thoughts and sources before you write.
  • Writing formulas to help you organize your stories.
  • More than 500 writing prompts covering multiple themes for writers in the U.S. and overseas.
  • Suggestions on how to share your stories on memorial websites and through books.
  • Additional resources for writing the stories of war.

This is the most important reference guide researchers need to begin writing the stories of World War II.

These books are also available in paperback along with our other World War II Research and Writing books.

© 2017 World War II Research and Writing Center

WWI Education – WWI Burial Files

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Michael Kokoska

It has been 100 years since the U.S. entered World War I. As we move through this 100th year, many people are beginning to investigate their World War I soldier’s history. A lot of people think all the records burned, as was the case with many World War II personnel files. While the fire did destroy some World War I files, there are still so many other records you can obtain.

Last week I wrote an article about U.S. Army Transports. These USAT transported both living soldiers and the dead. My great grand uncle, Michael Kokoska was one such soldier. Did you know that all soldiers, sailors, and Marines who died in World War I have a Burial File? This is the World War I equivalent of the World War II Individual Deceased Personnel File (IDPF).

The Burial File contains information on a soldier’s death, temporary burial overseas, correspondence from the family, and final burial details. Michael Kokoska’s contains a lot of handwritten letters from his parents begging for word on his burial location and return of his remains. The letters are heart breaking. There is also a document, written a year after Michael died, about the cause of his death. Is this really what happened? Perhaps. For now it is all I have to go on about the cause of his death. While Michael’s file was difficult and sad to read, it provided a lot of information on his service. This is one file you want if your soldier, sailor, or Marine died during the war.

View the Burial File for Michael Kokoska. Watch a short video about Michael.

Would you like to know more about Michael and his life? In my book, Stories of the Lost, you can read Michael’s full story.

The Burial Files, Morning Reports, Payroll Reports, and more are held at the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis. Would you like help obtaining these and other records available for World War I? Please contact us for details on how we can help you.

©  2017 World War II Research and Writing Center

Military Monday – Doughboy – MIA Website

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Meuse Argonne Cemetery
Meuse Argonne Cemetery

On my first trip to Europe in April 2015, I spent a lot of time at WWI cemeteries with my parents. My research is focused on WWII, although I do a little WWI when needed. As we visited the many American and British cemeteries and looked at the walls of the names of the missing, the one thing I kept hearing was, ‘It was such a waste.’

Many people know we still have soldiers, sailors, and Marines, Missing In Action from WWII, Korea, and Vietnam. What we often forget is the thousands of soldiers missing from WWI. Soldiers who will never be recovered by U.S. personnel because it is not in their mission. Soldiers who were likely blown to bits and there is nothing to recover, and therefore, have been forgotten.

World War I was a different kind of war than World War II. It was a stagnant boundary war for much of the time where small acres of land were fought over again and again. Bodies were buried, only to be hit by artillery and lost again. These are things we forget.

The United States World War I Centennial Commission has an extensive website of resources on the U.S. participation in WWI. This morning, another component was added to that, the Doughboy-MIA project.

This project strives to remember the names of the lost. Attempts to locate remains where possible and answer research requests. The website has a lot of information and research tips for you to help locate your missing soldier. While WWI research is similar to WWII, and we have the 1973 Fire to contend with, much of what you know about WWII research can be applied in the other war.

To learn more about WWII research, please check out my books Stories from the World War II Battlefield. Also, consider attending one of my lectures in the U.S. or Europe this year.

© 2016 Jennifer Holik

Traveling in their Footsteps 14 October 2015

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April 13, 2015 I made my first trip to Europe. Three weeks, six countries, and I saw five minutes of a lot of things. It was the most incredible trip I had ever taken. An experience for which I will be forever grateful. Changed my life, my perspective, and my work. That trip also took me on a spiritual journey unlike any other and opened my heart and soul up more than it had been. The soldiers who were already communicating with me, were now doing so at a higher level. It was a little crazy, unnerving at times, and amazingly cool. The writing I did during and after that trip allowed me to heal things within myself but also others through my books and programs.

Before I left Amsterdam on 6 May, the universe already had plans to bring me back in October. Having never traveled solo overseas, this idea was both scary and exciting. A good friend had been telling me for a year to travel alone, but it wasn’t time yet. I wasn’t ready until October 2015. Too many other things had to be let go of and healed or written before I could go.

On 13 October 2015, I boarded a plane in Chicago and flew back to Amsterdam, alone. Sitting on the plane, I knew the next three weeks would change my life in unexpected ways, bringing blessings, sadness, joy, inspiration, incredible experiences, relaxation, new opportunities, many new friends, an opportunity for balance, and the opportunity to release things which no longer served me. The trip also provided another major spiritual shift in my life. I invite you to travel with me in my soldier’s footsteps.

13-14 October 2015

Me after being up countless hours and traveling from Chicago to Bastogne.
Me after being up countless hours and traveling from Chicago to Bastogne.

Planning a European trip has its challenges from booking the flight, car rental, places to stay, and what you want to do. Add a layer of lecturing four times and another layer of scheduling time to meet a lot of Facebook friends who do WWII research, while I was there. I went with the flow, which a year ago I would not have done. My schedule changed daily the last two weeks before I departed, often between 3 and 4 a.m. as my friends in Europe would message me to confirm or arrange something. I even finalized details of my final speaking engagement right before I boarded the plane! While some people (and the me a year ago) might not have done well with this ‘go with the flow’ attitude, it absolutely worked for me.

I departed Chicago after 6 p.m. and arrived in Amsterdam by 9:30 a.m. their time (2:30 a.m. our time.) Made my way through customs and headed across the city-like Schiphol Airport to the car rental area. It all went smoothly. Soon I was on my way to my first destination, about 3.5 hours away, BASTOGNE!

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As I drove south though the Netherlands into Belgium, it snowed! Not much, just enough to cover the trees and look beautiful and magical. Driving after being up, technically at 2:30 a.m. is not so fun, but there are nice gas/restaurant station areas along the highway in the Netherlands. These are excellent places to stop for coffee and a yummy lunch. Stopping half-way to Bastogne as the snow fell was a good idea. I counted my many blessings over that lunch and pinched myself a lot because I couldn’t believe I was actually in Europe by myself!

When I arrived in Bastogne, I checked into the Hotel Melba. This is where everyone said to stay. I’m glad I listened to their advice. The staff was wonderful and helpful, room was comfortable, with a view from the back of old homes and a field with donkeys. They could be heard at all times of the day.

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I spent part of two days in Bastogne in May, so had an idea of where things were. Since it was late afternoon, to stay awake, I took a walk down to the tank and main street. First stop, with my journal in hand, was the Boulangerie Courtois for a coffee and piece of something decadent. I stayed in the bakery about an hour, again counting my blessings and pinching myself, while writing and enjoying my dessert.

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When the dessert was gone I walked back to the hotel by way of the 101st Airborne Museum – Le Mess – probably my favorite place in Bastogne. I did not go inside because they had just closed. My visit was planned for Friday. Instead, I returned to my room to catch up on email and prepare for the next day when I would meet Tom Scholtes and Doug Mitchell and see the Sauer River Crossing sites and visit my cousin James Privoznik in Luxembourg Cemetery.

Hotel Melba has a restaurant and I went down before dinner to enjoy a Jupiler beer at the bar while listening to a conversation by an American family. Dinner was a fantastic steak with loads of vegetables.  I enjoyed it immensely while again, listening to the conversations of those around me. The American family was seated at the table next to me and I heard about their visit to areas around Bastogne. Now, I used to be quiet and not interrupt total strangers conversations, but we all grow and change.

I heard the son say they would skip the museum in Bastogne the next day and at that point I had to interrupt and ask, which museum. He replied Le Mess. At that point I inserted myself into the conversation and told them they absolutely could not miss Le mess. That led to a longer conversation about why we were both in Europe, what I did for work, and them assuring me they would visit the museum. At that point, I finished my coffee and went upstairs to bed.

The son and I are now Facebook friends and we followed the others trips and had interesting conversations. You never know who you will meet when you travel. Or how it will change your plans and experiences.

At the end of my first very long travel day I was completely content. Look what I had done! Traveling solo! Who knew what the rest of the three weeks would bring.  I was sure as I drifted to sleep, thanking the Gods and Angels for the amazing day, the trip would change my life and in some way, the lives of all those I would meet or encounter, including my army of soldiers, sailors, and Marines, who are always with me.

© 2015 Jennifer Holik