Branon’s big-screen honored soldiers of a largely unknown army this weekend.
In honor of Ghost Army Recognition Day, Branson IMAX showed a documentary on the highly secretive World War II army units.
The Ghost Army used inflatable tanks, sound effects, and other techniques to fool and divert the enemy from advancing troops. The unit’s work was classified until 1996.
Soldiers in these units were not allowed to even tell their own families about the units.
“In the 1990’s it became public about Ghost Army and what we actually did to persuade and deceive the Germans during World War II,” said Tom Forster, vice president of marketing for Branson’s IMAX Entertainment Complex.
“My father was feeling the freedom to tell his children,” said Carolyn Spence Cagle who is a member of the Ghost Army Legacy Project Board and daughter of a Ghost Army soldier. “He went into his study, and he had a bureau. He pulled out medals from the French government that they had sent him and all the other members of the Ghost Army in gratitude for the number of lives they had saved in France during the war.”
There were 20 soldiers who served in the secretive units. The Ghost Army is credited with saving 30,000 lives.
Click here for a link to the feature story from Ozarks First.
(by: Christina Randall, Ozarks First)
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