Dear Editor: I would like to applaud Louie Zamperini’s courage and miraculous survival of a horrible experience which was above and beyond all human endurance and expectations.

A month and a half on a tiny raft with only the fish they could catch and rainwater they could collect; I don’t think I could have lasted five days unless, like William Harris, I had Louie to encourage and inspire me, and the beatings he endured daily in the POW camp at the hands of the “Bird” – and in later years he personally forgave him!

What a great example of courage and inspiration he is to all of us. Mere words are so inadequate to describe my admiration for him. I only wish he could have lived to be a most celebrated grand marshal of the coming Rose Parade.

Harold Hougland

Downey

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Published: July 17, 2014 - Volume 13 - Issue 14