Lucas County, Matt Moul & "Surviving Home"

Matthew Moul

Snow covers the ground here this Veterans Day morning --- and the projected low tonight is 9 degrees. While not a rerun of the great Armistice Day blizzard of 1940, it is a good day to stay inside, if you can, and watch a remarkable new film by Iowa native Matthew Moul and Jillian Moul, his wife. "Surviving Home" now is live-streaming free on PBS and other platforms.

Here's a link that will take you to it.

As the title suggests, military veterans, especially combat veterans, face formidable challenges not easily understood by civilians after coming home, faced with the expectation that they'll be able to slip seamlessly back into the life and the lives of family, friends and loved ones they left behind.

Released in October of 2017, "Surving Home" had been on the independent film circuit, winning numerous awards, before it was picked up by America ReFramed, a weekly independent documentary series broadcast on PBS. It premiered Nov. 7 and will live-stream on various platforms, I believe, for 30 days.

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Matt Moul has roots in various parts of Iowa --- born in Dubuque, he was raised from third grade on in Mason City and graduated from high school there.

But the link to Lucas County is a strong one --- his paternal grandfather, a young man and native son named Mark Bingaman, who did not survive World War II. Mark's life is commemorated by a cenotaph at Oxford Cemetery near the graves of his parents, Robert and Elsie Bingaman.

Mark's son, Robert Lee, was not yet a year old when his father died on March 19, 1945, aboard the U.S.S. Franklin near the Japanese mainland when it was struck by two armor-piercing bombs dropped by a single Japanese bomber. Although the ship survived, barely, 836 members of its crew were killed. Mark, with the others, was buried at sea.

In the years that followed, Matt's grandmother, Marcella, remarried and Robert Lee was adopted, assuming the surname "Moul."

Matthew and I became acquainted during 2011 because the Lucas County Historical Society collection includes a photograph, uniform and correspondence related to his grandfather, Mark.

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Matt and Jillian and their associates have been at work on "Surviving Home" for about 10 years while employed full-time --- and winning numerous honors --- on other projects in the film industry.

Jillian and Matt Moul (right) with Richard Delgado (left) and Robert Henline during a post-screening discussion session at Texas A&M-San Antonio

All voices in the film are those of military veterans and the stories of a dozen or more are woven into the narrative, but four are featured.

Robert Henline, a U.S. Army veteran of the Gulf and Iraq wars, was catastrophically burned by the explosion of an IED that killed four others in his vehicle. Stand-up comedy has proved therapeutic in his case.

Claude AnShin Thomas, a Vietnam War combat veteran, studied with Thich Nhat Hanh, was ordained a Buddhist monk and now leads programs for other veterans facing the challenges of adjusting to life after combat.

Tracey Cooper-Harris, a 12-year Iraq War veteran, faced the additional challenge of winning spousal benefits for her wife, Maggie, from the Veterans Administration after returning to civilian life.

And Richard Green, a World War II veteran estranged from his biological family, who finds solace in fund-raising for veteran causes with the support of younger members of his VFW post.

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The expressed goal of "Surviving Home" is to build bridges between the sometimes estranged veteran and civilian communities as well as to provide veterans themselves with examples of how their brothers and sisters have faced challenges --- and thrived.

And if you stay tuned as the credits roll, you'll find Mark's name at the head of the list of those veterans to whom the film is dedicated.