Jim Cava is a one-man USO show. But instead of being the type of movie star, comedian or professional singer typical of shows that have entertained American troops overseas since World War II, Cava is a soldier performing for kids.
Yet this is no mere entertainment. Cava is a man with a mission, someone who had dedicated his life to bringing patriotism and good character into the American way of life.
“My goal is to educate and re-educate, to enlighten the hearts and minds of all Americans, especially elementary school, middle school high school and college students,” he said recently.
Earlier this year, Cava brought his one-man show to Secaucus, part of his regular appearances at Huber Street School, where through narrative and song, he attempted to instill in students a sense of America’s heritage.
“I teach America the direct correlation between our American principles and patriotism, values and good character,” he said, noting that he is also trying to give kids awareness for what is right, and a respect for what is honorable, in others and themselves.
Cava brings to schools a resume of metals earned during his tour of duty in Vietnam in 1968, when as a petty officer with the United States Navy he served as a corpsman for the U.S. Marines. Among others honors, he earned the Purple Heart, combat action ribbon, and a national defense service metal. Several years ago, he was honored by the New Jersey State Assembly for his promotion of patriotism and, indeed, he has made appearances in numerous venues from the Vietnam War memorials in Washington D.C. and Homdel, N.J. to ceremonies marking Vietnam Remembrance Day and the 30th anniversary of the Tet Offensive.
Cava’s performances have made him something of a legend, even among veteran’s groups, who have seen him perform during public functions, shouting and singing, while lamenting the losses of American lives he and other veterans witnessed during the Vietnam Conflict.
In many ways, he has the fire and spirit a religious revival speaker, preaching at, singing for, talking about the cost in lives freedom has entailed over America’s long history. During an interview conducted earlier in April, Cava held back little about how disappointed he was over lack of patriotism in America. He blamed numerous entities from “a weak-willed government” during the Vietnam War to a decaying sense of character and respect among Americans in general.
Ached to fight for America
At 53, Cava looks as if he just stepped off an Marine transport, wearing a Marine class A or dress-up uniform so crisp he seems ready for inspection – with only the flapping, empty left sleeve revealing one of the wounds that sent him home from the war 30 years ago.
Cava grew up in Carlstadt, a small industrial town, across the Hackensack River from Secaucus, where he lived a very typical American life, playing baseball in the Little League, and running track in his church parish’s track meets. Cava says he is and always has been a devout Christian, attending Catholic schools all the way through high school. Vietnam, he says, became a very real place for him, long before he enlisted at age 17. He recalled how “concerned and saddened” he felt when the news reported the first American soldier’s death in Vietnam.
To join at 17, Cava needed his parents permission, and his father agreed, allowing Cava to pursue training in the U.S. Naval Training Center in Illinois, before moving on to San Diego for advanced military training at Basic Hospital Corps School to become a Corpsman. Later, he prepared for jungle warfare with Marines at their base in California, before being assigned to Vietnam.
“My base camp was a village called An Hoa, approximately 17 kilometers south of Da Nang,” Cava said recently.
His unit spent most of its time out in the field searching for enemies, and thus encountering numerous hazards from land mines, snipers and other hidden traps to poisonous snakes, malaria and leeches.
On Nov. 20, 1968, two months after his arrival in Vietnam, the helicopter transporting Cava and other members of his unit got hit by enemy fire as it tried to land in a battle zone.
“My chopper was the first to be hit,” Cava recalls. “The pilot and co-pilot were killed instant and the huge CH-46 (transport helicopter) went down, tumbled three times and exploded into a ball of flame.”
Days later – unconscious through the rescue in which fellow Marines saved his life – Cava opened his eyes in a hospital in Guam.
“My left arm was gone, and my legs were encased in hard plaster,” he said. He had also sustained injuries to his legs and back, injuries serious enough to send him back to the United States and eventually discharge him.
A soldier seeking a mission
Thirty-two years after his discharge, Cava can’t always relate the depth of disappointment he felt back then, how depressed he was, not just about his misfortune, but about how little support he felt by the public, blaming the government and lack of patriotism for a good part of his depression.
“For many hours and for many days and weeks, I would sit in church unfeeling yet searching,” he said. “I tried to find myself.”
Cava said he prayed for answers, even as he wandered through a variety of careers, volunteering to serve at veteran’s hospitals, mental facilities and hospices.
“I studied voice with four vocal teachers in New York City and New Jersey in pursuit of a singing career,” he said. Then he studied acting, psychology, even hotel restaurant management. “Like a pendulum, I went back and forth from singing and acting career to college and a degree,” he said.
Years went by, and he continued to pray. The whole time, he was aware of how absent patriotism and personal responsibility seemed from peoples’ everyday lives, and then in the early 1990s – as if an answer to his prayers – he decided he could do something about it, establishing a program he called “Operation Red, White and Blue,” a tour of public spaces from schools to official veterans’ ceremonies that would re-educate Americans to values he still considered scared.
“We brought him into Huber Street School because he talks about character development,” said Pat Cocucci, principal of Huber Street School, recently. “This meets the requirements for the state’s Core Curriculum standards, and Jim is a great motivational speaker.”
Cava has developed a series of five programs, each addressing a different level of student from kindergarten children to adults, each more sophisticated than the previous lecture, but all emphasizing themes he said he feels strongly enough about to sing over and shout out.
“I want to help these kids develop good character, and that means caring about themselves, their neighbors and their country,” Cava said.