06/06/2026
Most people think of the beaches when they think of D-Day. They think of Omaha Beach, the surf, the landing craft, and the men who charged into machine gun fire.
However, hours before in the middle of the night, 82 years ago, our boys were already in France bringing the heat.
The men of the 82nd and 101st Airborne jumped into the black void with little more than a parachute, a rifle, and a mission. Many landed miles from where they were supposed to be.
They were scattered and lost, and they did what we do best, figured it out, and prevented a slaughter on the beach.
That airborne legacy still lives on today in our neck of the woods.
Right here in Yuma, the Military Free Fall School at Yuma Proving Ground trains special operations personnel from every branch of the U.S. military.
The Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines all send their elite parachutists here to learn the skills required to infiltrate from the sky and accomplish missions few people will ever hear about.
We are a farming town.
We are a military town.
And every year, some of America’s most highly trained warriors step out of aircraft over our desert carrying on a tradition that stretches back to those young men Eisenhower spoke to before they boarded their planes on June 5, 1944.
Today we remember them.
The men who jumped first.
