http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8056069/Remembering the rangers of WWII
Historian Douglas Brinkley brings to life the terrifying invasion of Normandy. Read an excerpt from 'The Boys of Pointe du Hoc'
Forty years after the allied landing in Normandy, President Ronald Regan memorialized one of the toughest battles of the war, in which 180 rangers managed to neutralize six German guns at the cliffs of Pointe du Hoc and begin the liberation of Europe. In his latest book, "The Boys of Pointe du Hoc: Ronald Reagan, D-Day, and the U.S. Army 2nd Ranger Battalion," historian Douglas Brinkley brings that day to life, and explains how one of Regan's greatest speeches came to be. Read an excerpt.
Chapter One: Darby's Rangers
As a movie actor, history buff, and unabashed nationalist, President Ronald Reagan, while he prepared for the fortieth anniversary of D-Day, was keenly aware of the sheer power the word "ranger" conjured in the American imagination, even if his facts about their early combat antics were — as historian Garry Wills claims — often of the Disneyland triumphalist variety. Ever since Jamestown was established by English settlers in 1607, "rainger" or "ranger" had become part of the New World vocabulary.