Flags of Our Fathers (2000) is a book by James Bradley (with Ron Powers) about his father, Navy corpsman John Bradley, and five marines who were made famous by Joe Rosenthal’s iconic Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima photograph. In the DVD set of the movie there is wonderful, priceless material in the second DVD, when James Bradley discusses finding his father’s war memorabilia and notes—a discovery that inspired him to write the book. This treasure trove of information gave insight for James, and especially since his father rarely ever talked about the war. “He had a lot not to talk about,” says James. For me and my father, it was exactly the same.
My father (below) served in WWII as a Captain and spent time as a war photographer. I have all his war diaries and feel compelled to put his notes and photos into a book, but have yet to find a publisher. Anyway, that’s not the focus of this post. What is, is that my father was an avid writer, mainly of short stories, and many of these were published in a major newspaper. He also taught creative writing to adults and I can remember him being overjoyed when one of his students had her work published. As a teenager, I vividly remember dad pounding away on an electric typewriter, making corrections, and spending hours on his stories. His passion for writing and photography influenced my upbringing and I loved getting up early on cold, winter mornings to photograph valley mists and foggy landscapes—perfect for large black and white prints. 
When my father went into a rest home, most of his writing was lost or thrown out. As my own writing has progressed, I keep wondering what my father’s writing was like.
Just a week ago, my older sister passed on to me two of his complete stories and I am so thrilled to have them. He never raised a flag in WWII, but his flag flies high in my heart now that I am able to treasure his writing.