Kudos to the gentleman from Vassalboro who by letter chided the newspaper for its lack of a front-page remembrance of our veterans on the anniversary of D-Day (“D-Day deserved a place on paper’s front page,” June 16), but it was the same-day letter from a lady from Winthrop that provided an indictment of our society which increasingly and dangerously values celebrity over substance (“Sharing a story about Muhammad Ali”).

She applauded her memory of the late, gifted boxer who once ran alongside her busload of adoring children, waving to them as their bus sped away,. But this in juxtaposition to the memories of others, of a running away instead from a different bus, at a different time, carrying fellow selective service inductees off to become veterans of our country, and heroes, themselves.

Richard Hyatt

Augusta