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Military & Veterans at State Agency Databases Project
This week’s State Agency Databases Project subject highlight is Military & Veterans, featuring 22 states that project volunteers know to have publicly searchable databases in this subject area. Three examples from this compilation are:
Alabama Civil War Service Database – Search Civil War service records by name, branch, company unit, regiment unit, or co. unit name.
Service Provider Search by Location – A searchable database of services available to California veterans, their survivors and dependents at the federal, state and local levels. It includes federal, state and county veterans offices, contact information for veterans organizations, services available for homeless veterans, veterans offices at educational institutions and other veterans-related material, searchable by keyword, location, and type of service.
Wisconsin Veterans Memorial Catalog – Documents memorials dedicated to Wisconsin veterans throughout Wisconsin, the U.S., and internationally. The Wisconsin Veterans Museum Research Center actively maintains this resource which includes the history, physical condition, and location of each memorial.
For more, see http://godort.libguides.com/militarydbs. Some military history databases are listed under History, People and Culture. It’s a judgement call.
If you know of state agency produced databases in the area of Military & Veterans, either comment here or use the “Email me” link on the guide to report a database, which will be forwarded to the appropriate project volunteer.
In honor of Veterans’ Day
Because today is Veterans’ Day, I thought it would be interesting to investigate some recent government publications from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs. Here are a few things I learned by searching for “veterans” in the Catalog of Government Publications:
- Merchant Mariners who served during World War II were not granted full veterans’ status until January 17, 1988. Legislation has been proposed to offer additional compensation to this group of veterans. (See here for the Congressional hearing where I first learned of this. For more information, you can also see the House bill, the related Senate bill, and an additional House bill that specifically addresses Merchant Mariners that were awarded the Purple Heart.)
- Roughly 30% of people who have served in the military and have signed up to receive educational benefits as accorded by the GI Bill never take advantage of these benefits. The House Committee on Veterans Affairs is working to expand these educational benefits to include a wider variety of programs – including “short-term, high-cost” educational programs. I gather that, in the recent past, these short-term, high-cost programs have focused on high tech. One of the points brought up in a hearing held last May is that there should be support for educational programs in other high-demand fields – for example, health care .
From what I’ve read, it seems that the Department of Veterans’ Affairs is chronically underfunded. One of the issues brought up in the Merchant Mariners hearing is the question of where the funding will come from in order to compensate this group of veterans (as well as other groups who contributed in World War II, but have not yet been recognized). Since our discussion over the last several days has oft turned to the discussion of civic engagement, I’d like to encourage Free Government Information readers to advocate for or become involved with veterans’ affairs. Let’s honor our veterans with action, and not just words.
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