– Rishi Sharma, released to CBS News
A decade ago, a young American began recording interviews with World War II combat veterans to satisfy his curiosity about the war.
That curiosity became something of an obsession, and 3,000 veterans later, his hard drives and SD cards have become something of a national treasure.
Brought to us from Steve Hartman for CBS News’ “On the Road,” 28-year-old Rishi Sharma says it’s been a privilege to meet the “moral compass” behind our society.
“I’ve spent every single day of the last 10 years doing that,” said Sharma, having recently finished speaking with a 100-year-old survivor of Iwo Jima.
Sharma was first interviewed by Hartman in 2016 when the fresh-faced post high schooler was mostly driving around his southern California region for his curiosity.
At that time, the young man was planning a multi-year trip around the country with the aim of saving as many stories from veterans as could be saved before the curtain came down on the Greatest Generation.
Hartman shared that back when he first met Sharma, there were some 700,000 WWII vets still among us. Today, that number stands at 30,000.
“Just the advice they impart silently steers the ship of this country,” Sharma said.
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