Gretchen McKay

This is the last in a series on Lt. Col. Chris Cieslak’s deployment to Afghanistan:   A bunch of red, white and blue balloons danced at the front door when Lt. Col. Chris Cieslak came home earlier this month after a year in Afghanistan. But the rest of her homecoming didn’t exactly go as expected. […]

VICKSBURG, Miss. — War is never easy, but residents of this busy river town perched on the bluffs of the Mississippi River were especially miserable when on July 4, 1863, the 47-day siege ordered by Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant ended with the Confederate Army’s surrender. Cut off from supplies and shell-shocked by a steady […]