Canton Man Attending D-Day 75th Anniversary Events

(News/Talk 1480 WHBC) – A Canton businessman and military enthusiast is in France for the 75th anniversary of D-Day.

Jim Cassler says it’s been an amazing experience to visit the beaches of Normandy where Allied forces landed on June 6th 1944 and thousands down their lives to rid the world of tyranny.

“There are tens of thousands of people here from all over the world, I didn’t think it would be an event of this magnitude.”

When we spoke with Cassler he was on Utah Beach and said a C-47 was about to bring in paratroopers from the Army jump team to do a static line drop, simulating what they did 75 years ago.

He says there have been a lot of people dressed in period costumes and military jeeps and other vehicles on the beaches.

He says an event with the Band of Brothers cast included about 25 veterans from World War II, one of which was Harry “Pete” Shaw, from North Canton.

Cassler, whose father Elmer was a pilot during World War II, says it’s an honor to be able to meet so many war veterans of the Greatest Generation during this trip.

D-Day was the largest amphibious invasion in the history of the world, involving around 160,000 allied troops and 5,000 landing and assault craft.