After 10 years, one man's mission to preserve WWII veterans' legacy continues

Yorktown, New York — For 10 years, Rishi Sharma has crisscrossed the country on a mission to preserve history, interviewing more than 3,000 World War II combat veterans, and he's not done yet.

"For the last 10 years, I've been on the mission to interview every single World War II combat veteran," the 28-year-old said. "And I've quite honestly spent every single day of the last 10 years doing that."  

Rishi recently interviewed 100-year-old Marine veteran Nils Mockler of Yorktown, New York. Nils was a combat intelligence scout, and his first battle was one of the bloodiest in Marine history — and one of the most inspiring — Iwo Jima.

"What did it mean to you seeing the American Flag being raised?" Rishi asked Nils. 

"Well, the hair on my arms still stands up when I think about how beautiful it was," Nils said. 

Rishi started his journey 10 years ago by driving around his Southern California neighborhood to record interviews with veterans, but then he expanded his outreach by creating a map of places he hoped to visit in the years to come. 

"There are real superhero World War II vets out there, and I want to meet them," Rishi said in 2016. 

Rishi's passion for World War II history didn't come from family tradition. His parents immigrated to the U.S. from India, and he has no military background. 

The project — called Remember WWII — is funded by donations, and Rishi talks to the vets for hours, then gives the recordings to the families.

A decade ago, there were about 700,000 World War II veterans still alive. Today, only about 30,000 remain. And Rishi says when they're all gone — probably in the next decade or so — America will lose a lot more than just a bunch of old war stories.

"Because for so long they have been the moral compass of our society," Rishi said. "Just the advice that they impart silently steers the ship of this country."

This weekend, we get to celebrate 250 years as a nation. And Rishi reminds us that it is not by accident, it is thanks in large part to that generation of sacrifice and moral clarity - that we call the greatest.