As World War II drew to a close, Sgt. Irvin Schwartz laid out a proposal to honor the Pine Grove area servicemembers when they returned home.
Letters from War – Ideas for a World War II memorial in Pine Grove and a dislike of monuments – 1945

As World War II drew to a close, Sgt. Irvin Schwartz laid out a proposal to honor the Pine Grove area servicemembers when they returned home.
German artillery shells struck down Sergeant Irvin Schwartz on February 27, 1945. He wrote home to his parents to comfort them that he wasn't severely wounded.
In March 1945, Irvin Schwartz's hometown newspaper published news of his Bronze Star. A week later they shared the news he had been wounded.
Irvin Schwartz comments on the mail he's received from home in Pennsylvania and how letters that have nothing to do with the war were his favorites.
A letter from the front lines in Belgium as the Battle of the Bulge raged in January 1945.
In a February 1945 letter to Harper Updegrave, Irvin Schwartz stated his intention to join the American Legion once he returned home from war.
A 1990 study by a defense contractor details the experiences of Irvin Schwartz and his comrades in the hellish Battle of Dom Bütgenbach in 1944.
In as much detail as he could get by US Army censors, Irvin Schwartz describes his unit's action in the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944.
Irvin Schwartz's letter home to Schuylkill County in January 1945 explained the bleak holidays he spent on the front lines of the Battle of the Bulge.
A letter from Corporal Irvin Schwartz from December 1944 is excerpted in the West Schuylkill Press-Herald.