Returning the Sword at Fort Snelling, April 18, 2026: Reflections

The after­noon at Fort Snelling still rever­ber­ates through me. Between 50–60 peo­ple came togeth­er at Fort Snelling on Saturday, April 18, to share the sto­ry of Returning the Sword. A col­lec­tive expectan­cy filled the room. I won­dered if we came for this WWII sto­ry with the Iran War on our minds. We all had watched the sense­less bomb­ings on our screens. The maim­ing. The killing. We heard or read about the blood­thirsty tweets from Trump and Hegseth. News of the day had made Orval’s WWII sword sto­ry all the more relevant.

I delib­er­ate­ly opened my pre­sen­ta­tion, con­nect­ing Trump’s recent Easter Day wartime threat to destroy the Iranian civ­i­liza­tion with Orval’s real-life expe­ri­ence step­ping into the remains of Nagasaki after nuclear war. I spoke about Sachiko Yasui, the six-year-old I had writ­ten about who mirac­u­lous­ly sur­vived the atom­ic bomb­ing of her city on August 9, 1945 and her long path to peace— about search­ing for a WWII vet­er­an who had been first into Nagasaki as part of the U.S. occu­py­ing force—about find­ing Captain Orval Amdahl’s WWII oral his­to­ry in the Minnesota History Center, and the con­ver­gence of events that led me to meet Orval and his sword.

With that back­ground, the audi­ence was ready to lis­ten to the actu­al pic­ture book read­ing of Returning the Sword.  Picture books, I said, are for every­one. I could have end­ed the event at the last page, but we all knew there was so much more to talk about. My five guest pan­elists, Lori and Jacob Harrington, Kimmy Tanaka, Amy Blumenshine, and Mark Ritchie indi­vid­u­al­ly and col­lec­tive­ly took Orval’s sto­ry to a deep­er level.

Jacob Harrington, Orval’s great-grandson, shared his child­hood mem­o­ries hid­ing in the clos­et with the sword as a six-year-old play­ing hide-and-seek and then as a mid­dle school­er inter­view­ing his great-grandfather for History Day. Jacob’s History Day project is the rea­son Orval’s WWII sto­ry is in the MN History Center’s “Greatest Generation” library.

Jacob’s moth­er Lori recount­ed that the sto­ry of Orval’s return­ing the sword has found its way to the U.S. Marine Corp and is now part of its lore.

Kimmy Tanaka spoke of the impor­tance of cross-cultural con­nec­tions that lead to last­ing ties of friend­ship and peace. She knows how true this is. Kimmy her­self is a child of a cross-cultural marriage.

Amy Blumenshine, a schol­ar of moral injury, took us fur­ther into war’s deep wounds and the heal­ing and rec­on­cil­ing that must come if vet­er­ans are tru­ly to sur­vive their war expe­ri­ence. War does not end at war’s end. Soldiers may take off their uni­forms, but they still har­bor the moral injury to their con­science when com­mand­ed to kill and destroy or wit­ness the unimag­in­able. Given the fight­ing in the Pacific dur­ing WWII and the wit­ness­ing of the destruc­tion of Nagasaki after the atom­ic bomb, Orval’s pol­ish­ing the sword may have been his way of silent­ly heal­ing from his own moral injuries.

Lastly, for­mer MN Secretary of State Mark Ritchie spoke of oth­er vet­er­an sto­ries he knew that par­al­leled Orval’s. The cru­el expe­ri­ences in sol­diers’ lives can crip­ple them for life, even if they return home able-bodied. Mark’s remarks and civic ser­vice brought a grav­i­tas to all that was said that afternoon.

At the end of our time togeth­er, I pre­sent­ed Jacob Harrington with a large framed pho­to of Orval and Marie Amdahl, his great-grandparents. Years ago, when I first start­ed writ­ing about Orval and his sword, I bought this pho­to at an art gallery in the Amdahl’s home­town of Lanesboro. Jacob’s father Jeff Harrington, had been the pho­tog­ra­ph­er. I loved the pho­to, but that Saturday morn­ing at home, I kept star­ing at it. The pho­to wasn’t real­ly mine. It belonged to Jake. In the spir­it of the sword’s return, I need­ed to give the pho­to to him.

The fol­low­ing day, I received an email from Mark Ritchie: Yesterday was super impor­tant — you have plant­ed seeds deep and these will become trees and then a for­est, I do believe. I’m not sure of Mark’s prophe­cy, but I do know that Saturday after­noon each of us walked away with seeds that remind us of war’s ever-lasting toll and the rea­son peace, no mat­ter how hard to achieve, is the seed we must plant.

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