Cord Byrd: “in his book, ``The Greatest Generation,'' NBC's news anchorman Tom Brokaw discusses the greatness of the generation of…”

“in his book, ``The Greatest Generation,'' NBC's news anchorman Tom Brokaw discusses the greatness of the generation of Americans who withstood the problems, the terrors, the doubts, the fears of the 1930s and the 1940s. He points out that it was this generation of Americans who ``came of age in the Great Depression when economic despair hovered over the land like a plague.'' When Pearl Harbor made it irrefutably clear that America was not a fortress, he writes, ``This generation . . . answered the call to help save the world from the two most powerful and ruthless military machines ever assembled.'' Afterward, those people ``helped convert a wartime economy into the most powerful peacetime economy in history.'' This was ``the greatest generation any society has ever produced.'' Like Mr. Brokaw, I, too, admire the generation of Americans who survived the hardships of the Great Depression and won World War II. They were truly outstanding Americans, a great generation. I am proud to say they are of my generation. But ever since reading Mr. Brokaw's book, I can't help but think about the greatness of not only that generation of Americans, but also the greatness of generation after generation of Americans.”