Celebrating Greatest Generation Values and the Surviving .5%
- Anne Keene
- 14 minutes ago
- 4 min read
One of my favorite books is Tom Brokaw's The Greatest Generation. Today, less than .5 % or roughly 50,000 of the men and women who served in WWII survive, underscoring the importance of remembering these veterans, and the values they lived by.
To celebrate their legacy I am posting stories about survivors including 90- and 100-something professional athletes, nurses caring for veterans, teachers, ministers, and good people from all walks of life to emphasize the things they taught us about living, loving and learning from the past.
It's simple values like loyalty, respect, and patriotic duty that are getting diluted by technology and pure lack of human communication. As I continue this journey I hope you will follow this Blog, chiming in with comments and suggestions for other stories to share.
August 21, 2025
A heart-felt “Thank you,” and a willingness to listen to a Veteran who suffered at war and upon returning home, resulted in a Vietnam Veteran finally feeling welcome, and his daughter becoming a Nurse for the VA.
Christina Troncin, RN, is a nurse with the Robley Rex VA Medical Center whose father played a big role in her decision to be a nurse for the VA.
“I love my Veterans,” said Troncin. “I am a nurse to the greatest generation.”
Troncin’s dad served in Vietnam as a heavy equipment operator. Driving bulldozers, he cleared jungles so that they could build bases and create airstrips.
“He told me that when he went to use his bulldozer, it would look like someone had poured orange soda all over his bulldozer,” said Troncin.
The orange soda that covered his bulldozer was Agent Orange. After returning home from the war, he received no Welcome Home and then developed Lung Cancer. For Troncin’s father, while the Cancer treatment was difficult, it was the cost of the treatment that devastated him financially.
“When I asked why he didn't go to the VA for services, he said, ‘The things that I did in Vietnam were horrible, and I don't deserve help,’” said Troncin.
However, her dad finally reached the point where he was too broke to continue to pay for treatment and agreed to contact the VA with my assistance.
“On the initial call to the VA to start the process, the person answering the phone talked with my dad and told him ‘Thank you for your service.’ My dad started crying and said ‘No one outside of my family has ever told me that,’” said Troncin.
"They spit on us and called us baby killers, you know," her father told the representative on the phone. The VA representative told him how sorry she was that he had been treated so poorly, and she appreciated him. This was how his relationship with the VA began. And for Troncin, this moment was so poignant that she later joined the VA herself.
“I will never forget it,” said Troncin.
Troncin was working as a nurse for Jewish Hospital when her dad made that call. Sadly, her dad passed only a few weeks after that call, before his initial visit to the VA.
“I think of my dad a lot throughout the day as I care for my Veterans,” said Troncin. “I treat them the way I would have wanted my dad to have been treated if he would have lived long enough to have gotten services from the VA.”
Troncin, a second-career nurse with a bachelor’s in psychology, had worked for many years as a case manager before she went to nursing school.
“I originally was a case manager and felt God's call on my life to become a nurse,” said Troncin. “I graduated from nursing school at 40 and have loved every minute of being a nurse.”
She started her nursing career working with Volunteers of America, caring for individuals with developmental and intellectual disabilities. Later, at Jewish hospital, she worked as a Neuro and Transplant ICU nurse. After her father passed, she applied for a nursing position with Veteran’s Affairs.
“During my interview I had tears flowing down my face talking about my dad and how he could have gotten services, but due to his own demons, didn't,” said Troncin. “I'm surprised they hired me.”
But the Robley Rex VA Medical Center did hire her, and she has been caring for Veterans here for almost three years now.
Troncin works as part of a Home-Based Primary Care team, where she travels to get to those Veterans who would have a difficult time getting to the VA clinic. The HBPC team goes into the home of these Veterans to provide many different types of care, including physical and occupational therapy, primary care, speech therapy, recreation therapy, wound care, and more.
“I am a nurse to warriors and heroes and men and women that gave everything for their country,” said Troncin. “I serve Veterans, because the Veterans I see are heroes, like my dad, and they deserve honor, respect, and the very best treatment that I can provide as a nurse. I am so proud to be a VA nurse.”
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