By Sean Sullivan 

On a Friday morning in early November, generations bridged the divide of decades over breakfast.

The event was part of the Veterans Oral History Project, a campaign sponsored by the Morse Institute Library. The project, which ran from Nov. 5 to Nov. 12, was scheduled to encompass and highlight Veterans Day, which is celebrated on Nov. 11.

Morse Institute Library has collected and archived the stories of more than 360 veterans since the program was begun over 20 years ago. Its mission is to preserve these stories as oral history, lessons that future generations can listen to and learn from.

At that breakfast on Nov. 7, students at Kennedy Middle School shared tables and doughnuts with vets, attentive while the older visitors shared memories from their time in the armed services.

Posters filled the school’s walls and windows, designed and drawn by students in honor of Veterans Day.

Chris Forest, an eighth grade civics teacher at Kennedy, helped plan the meet-and-greet and guided students in creating and organizing the posters.

It’s “helping them realize that the military plays such an important role in our country,” said Forest.

The breakfast was a rotating roundtable event, featuring a visiting veteran at each, shoulder-to-shoulder with students who sat and completed the circle.

At a scheduled time, veterans would take leave of their group to join another, replaced by a new speaker. 

Some brought artifacts from their time in the service, tangible touchstones that recalled a bygone era and phase of life.

Visitors to the Natick Common last month may have noticed an array of signs lining its walkways. These were the main event of the Veterans  Storywalk, a way the Morse Institute Library and the town sought to honor veterans and publicize the oral history project.

These took the form of familiar yard signs, but each was dedicated to the story and service of a particular veteran. The signs featured a portrait of each servicemember, along with the branch and theater in which they served.

Also on each was a QR code that led to a video or audio file of that veteran recounting their memories and experiences in the armed forces.

Longtime Natick resident Paul Carew is among them. He grew up and still resides in town, and served in the United States Marine Corps.

Carew signed up with the service in 1970, at a time when the Vietnam War was roiling the world stage in America and abroad. His father, an Army veteran, didn’t approve of the decision.

“I didn’t make any friends at home” by joining up, said Carew.

Being from the Bay State, Carew earned the nickname “Boston” during his boot camp training at Parris Island.

Upon graduation, he trained to be a radio operator and received his orders. He would serve as support for a helicopter force based on the USS Tripoli.

“We went all over southeast Asia,” said Carew, including several trips to Vietnam. His service also brought him to Thailand, Japan and the Philippines.  “We didn’t have a direct combat role,” though the inherent risk of serving abroad was always in view.  

Carew described the radio he carried as heavy box strapped to his back. “They were cumbersome, to say the least.”

Since the radio operator was often attached at the hip with a unit’s officer, the communication device also served as a target painted on the back of whoever carried it. 

“I don’t remember any beauty to this country,” said Carew of Vietnam. That was in contrast to the other theaters he’d visited. American use of the infamous defoliant Agent Orange had so scarred the landscape, he said.

The full story of Carew’s military career and those of his fellow veterans can be viewed online at Natick’s Veterans Oral History Project. There, audiences can browse servicemembers by name or via the conflicts or peacetime roles in which they served.

For more of their stories, visit natickveterans.com.