I was born in 1945, virtually minutes after the end of WWII. While I was growing up the war was somehow always in the background and LIFE Magazine was always in my lap.

These photographs were taken at the WWII Air Show in August, 2002 in Reading, PA. The people in them are re-enactors. The hardware has been restored. Some of the accessories have been recreated but most are authentic.

I tried to photograph what I saw as if I were a war correspondent for LIFE during the Second World War. It wasn't easy. There were something on the order of 100,000 spectators to shoot around. The photographs are a memorial to my father and all those other fathers who have served.

Dad had his share of stories from that period. I'm sure other fathers did as well. These pictures bring those stories back and those stories will serve as the un-written captions for these images.