Chaminade High School students prayed for hours at the gravesite of a long-forgotten alum who heroically died after the D-Day invasion of Normandy during a recent trip to France.
Officials at the Long Island Catholic school had just found out about the tragic death of 1935 graduate John J. McDonald a week before an annual spring trip to the country.
They learned of the Mineola man killed in action two days after Allied forces stormed the beaches in June of 1944 — and found out he’s one of the thousands laid to rest at the massive cemetery there.
“We never even thought that one of our alumni was buried over in France,” Chaminade president Brother Thomas Cleary told The Post.
“We know he married, had no children…I don’t know if anyone has ever visited his grave.”
The school scrambled to rearrange its Easter break travel plans and had all 30 students, taking turns in small groups, pray for nearly an hour at the grave of the Army Air Corps lieutenant who was shot down two days after D-Day.
“It really set in. This man, he’s buried here — alone in a foreign country without his family,” said junior Andrew Kerr, who was part of the sobering moment that paid respect to the bombardier who flew 71 missions with the Ninth Air Force.
“I just can’t even imagine what it would be like, that one day you just get up, go to war, you don’t see your family again.”
A hero’s legacy — 81 years later
Although many details about McDonald’s life remain unclear, it is known that he was a track athlete at Chaminade who had a love for model airplanes before flying in one.
McDonald even threw one he spent weeks building onto the school’s football field during a homecoming game.
“You hear about it and you feel like it’s so distant from you,” Kerr added.
“But then you see his picture on the wall with the class of 1935 at school, and it all of a sudden it becomes ‘wow, this really does relate to me.’”
The 1918-born warrior first entered the Marines in 1937 and, after a medical discharge, re-enlisted in the Army in the thick of World War II.
He wed while on leave in 1943.
Brother Cleary is now trying to track down a member of McDonald’s family to connect with and share the experience and learn more about him.
“They were people like us, exactly like us,” junior Gianni Bono, whose brother is a Marine, said.
“It’s an insane thing to think about.”
Being at the gravesite steps from the once bloody beaches of the Great Crusade to liberate Europe also gave the students a perspective not viewed in even an advanced placement curriculum.
“When you learn about this in history class, it’s just a number,” said junior Dylan Stampfel.
“But when you go there and you see the over 9,000 graves just lined up on the perfectly manicured lawn… it’s very humbling.”
The teens also visited on a gorgeous day with polar opposite conditions to the notorious rain and fog that the beach storming is remembered for.
“What struck most of the students was that most of the beaches are now used recreationally,” said Marta Agosti, the school’s world language chair who planned the trip.
“But I thought that is the best way in which you can say thank you to all the people that actually died there — so that we could continue with life.”
Junior Maximillian Matuszewski, who watched “Saving Private Ryan” ahead of the trip, said Tom Hanks’ core-shaking final words of “earn this” have new meaning to him.
“It means to put my best foot forward always, and work as hard as I can,” he said.
“And to be thankful that I would never have to experience something that McDonald would.”
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