IMAGE GALLERY: Heritage Raises New American Flag

Milton “Mickey” Fieger, at the age of 21, was one of 23,000 U.S. soldiers, who landed on Utah Beach in June of 1944.

Now, 95, he still remembers fellow soldiers, who died on Omaha Beach in France during World War II.

Utah Beach was the furthest west of the five beaches designated for the D-Day landings in Normandy and the beach with the fewest allied deaths. (Studies have deaths at Utah 589, Omaha 3,686, Gold 1,023, Juno 1,242, Sword 1,304.)

Yesterday, Fieger read the names of those who gave their lives for freedom in America and against Hitler during a ceremony at Heritage at Framingham, including the name of his father, who fought in World War I.

The senior and assisted living center on Water Street also raised a new American flag on its property with the help of two Framingham Police officers.

“We wanted to keep the memory of loved ones alive” for our residents said Heritage at Framingham Executive Director Ellen Adams.

The raising of a new flag was the center’s symbolic way to do that.

Dozens of residents from the Center sat outside and listened as Fieger read the names, the old flag was lowered, Taps was played, and the new flag was raised. Then the entire group recited the Pledge of Allegiance to the new flag waving high in the blue sky.

Fieger also remembers visiting the Dachau concentration camp, where he helped translate for survivors and prisoners for the military, as he spoke both Hebrew and German.

“Hitler needed to be stopped,” said the U.S. Army Veteran.