Really? You actually know some WW2 VETS, if they saw your posts how proud would they be of you ? You make me sick, bragging, I served, did you? I never claimed to be a hero, those guys, my friends came home in black bags, ! Nevermind? Unacceptable Bragging, the new WEST term for vets day! LUV YA!
Yes I do know a WW2 VET and his name is George Nicolau.
http://www.peggybrowningfund.org/pdf/Bio_George_Nicolau.pdf
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Tonight’s honoree, George Nicolau, is the
first arbitrator recognized by The Peggy Browning
Fund. Often referred to as the Dean of Arbitrators,
George has been arbitrating and mediating
labor-management and employment disputes for
more than 40 years.
George’s career prior to entering this profession was equally
distinguished.
While serving as a B-17 Navigator in the 8th Air Force during
World War II, he was severely wounded during an air raid over Leipzig and,
following intensive rehabilitation, he became a retired officer and gentleman
before he could vote. After the war, he entered the University of Michigan
earning a degree in Political Science and Economics. George then left his
home state to attend Columbia University Law School as a Harlan Fiske
Stone Scholar. While at Columbia, he worked for both Charles Hughes of
the Textile Workers of America and John Acropolis, the leader of the IBT’s
Local 456, whose murder is still an unsolved crime.
When George told his Greek immigrant parents that he wanted to be
a labor lawyer, they protested that other fields were more tranquil and
lucrative. His response was that his father’s stories, of long working hours
for low wages in unprotected non-union conditions when he first came to the
States in the early 1900’s, had an impact.
After earning his J.D. degree from Columbia, George joined the firm
of Sheehan and Harold where he represented Local 6 of the Typographers,
Local 2 of the Printing Pressmen, the New York locals of the Atomic Energy
Workers, then known as the Gas, Coke and Chemical Workers, and Local
456 of the Teamsters. At Cooper, Ostrin and DeVarco he represented
Actors Equity, the National Maritime Union, the Newspaper Guild and the
Communication Workers of America, then New York Telephone.
During the Kennedy Administration, George joined the Peace Corps
staff where he was instrumental in initiating the first blue collar Peace Corps
Volunteer Projects in Peru and Guiana. At the request of Sargent Shriver,
he served as Deputy Director of the Northeast Region of the US Office of
Economic Opportunity. Appointed by NYC Mayor John Lindsay, he became
the first Commissioner of the Community Development Agency – the largest
anti-poverty program in the nation.
In the early 70’s, George, Ron Haughton and Ted Kheel co-founded the
Institute for Mediation and Conflict Resolution where he taught mediation
techniques to community leaders, members of the Dept. of Justice’s Community
Relations Service, prison guards and inmates and the entire Community Affairs
and Precinct Command Force of the NYPD. After mediating a number of
community disputes in New York, such as the long and bitter Seward Park
housing controversy and the clash between the African-American and Hassidic
communities in Crown Heights, George decided to try is hand at arbitration.
George has been the arbitrator between the NBA and the National Basketball
Players Association (1979-81), the Indoor Soccer League (1980 – 93); first
Impartial Chairman between the NHL and the NHL Players Association (1993-
1996); the American-based arbitrator between the NHL and the International
Ice Hockey Federation, and the longest serving Impartial Chairman for Major
League Baseball and the MLB Players Association (1986-1995).
He has been the Impartial Chairman between the League of Voluntary
Hospitals and Local 1199 since 1993; one of three Impartial Members of the
New York City Office of Collective Bargaining since 1987; the Impartial
Chairman to the NBPA Regulations Governing Player Agents since 1986 and a
panel arbitrator for all major airlines, theatre, television, movie and newspaper
industries.
Still a full-time arbitrator and mediator, George has been presented with
Awards of Distinction by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service and
the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers and the American Arbitration
Association’s Wise Owl Award for distinguished service. He is married to
Siobhan Nicolau, a former program officer for the Ford Foundation, and has five
children and six grandchildren.
OTTER