In 1969, a few months after returning home from serving in the Vietnam War, Fred Amore of Northport found himself face down on the floor of the local King Kullen.

In Vietnam ”we used to get mortar attacks a lot,” Amore, 62, said. “They were really loud.” So when the local fire department noon siren sounded, “I took down for cover. I was so embarrassed.”

Amore’s story will be joining those of other Long Island combat veterans at the Library of Congress. Under the first program of its kind on Long Island, launched by U.S. Rep. Steve Israel (D-Dix Hills), 40 local Boy and Girl Scoutshave videotaped and conducted 50 interviews with local veterans. The program is part of a larger effort with the Library of Congress’ Veterans History Project, which, through the American Folklife Center, collects and preserves personal accounts of war.

“The Scouts, through this program, become eyewitnesses of history,” Israel said. “I want them to understand these freedoms we have came with a price, and these veterans paid that price.”

Meredith Kiesel, 17, of Northport, a Senior Girl Scout with Troop 3298 in East Northport, interviewed Amore. “It was really sad that he was so used to hearing gunshots all the time,” she said. “I never heard stories like that before.”

She was assisted by her brother, Michael, 15, a Scout with Troop 52 inNorthport. “It was a real honor to see who defended our country,” he said. “I learned more from Fred than I ever learned from a history textbook.”

Thoughts of death

Amore, who was drafted in March 1967, told of his service in Soc Trang province in the Mekong Delta. “You think, at 19 years old, ‘Is this it? Is this the end of my life?’ It’s sad, but that’s what you think about,” he said.

He told the Scouts of a night when he awoke to find the base surrounded by 50 anti-personnel mines. “These things were everywhere. It was the scariest moment of my life in war,” he said, until members of the base managed to deactivate the mines.

For Peter Butko, 64, of West Sayville, serving in Vietnam left no time for fear. “You see death every day,” Butko said. “But you have no time to reflect or be scared. You concentrate on your job and do what you have to do to survive.”

Butko, who was drafted and served with the 9th Infantry Division, was one of 47 soldiers in his original platoon – and one of only three who survived. The platoon was ambushed when it inadvertently entered a Viet Cong base camp – and his best friend died in his arms. “We tried to carry him up to a more secure area,” Butko said. “But it was too late.”

Now he feels honored that his memories are becoming a part of history. “It’s our history, and I am proud to share it,” he said.

A narrow escape

Ralph Panetta, 87, of Bay Shore, served in the 45th Infantry Division duringWorld War II. “When my great-grandchildren want to know about me and what I did for my country, they can go to the Library of Congress,” Panetta said. “I will always be there.”

He said a bombshell fell two feet away from him one night when he was in a foxhole on a mountain in Italy – but it didn’t explode. “I hear the fins flying over my head, and I don’t know where they are coming from,” Panetta recounted. “I was scared, but when the bomb didn’t explode, I realized I was going to live to a really long age.”

Robert Blake, 65, of Northport enlisted in the Army and served in Vietnam with the 557th Engineer Battalion of the 18th Engineer Brigade as a heavy-equipment mechanic working on rock-crushing units and asphalt plants for road building. He was on duty one night in the Military Assistance CommandVietnam compound in Don Duong district when the compound came under attack. A major and two sergeants were killed, and Blake said he ran down the streets to get help.

“I’m the only guy out there,” he said. “I was scared. But it is what it is – you have to be out there.”

For years after he returned home, Blake said, he seldom talked about the war – a common experience among veterans hoping they could move forward with their lives. Now, he said, talking with the Scouts about his experiences has helped bring closure and given him a sense of pride.

“You get the story out the way you want it to be heard,” he said. “There are no fancy ribbons around it. It’s just the truth, and it’s history.”

Emily Kline, 15, a Senior Girl Scout from Hauppauge, said she had studied about wars, “but a textbook is very general, and you don’t really get into the emotions of it all.”

Blake said, “Listening to firsthand accounts is the best way for students to learn. Veterans aren’t a part of a history textbook. They are the history textbook.”

When Kimberly Dresch was diagnosed with a form of breast cancer, she swore she would never become “a pink-wearing, pink-walking zombie.”

“I thought, ‘You have nothing else better to do with your life than walk in walks?’ ” Dresch said. “I just didn’t get it.”

Now, almost two years after her diagnosis, Dresch, 53, an artist who lives in Great Neck, is raising money for Strides Against Breast Cancer and theAmerican Cancer Society. For the months of September and October, at the Village of Great Neck Plaza Courthouse, she is showcasing “Re-Emergence Support Hope,” a photo exhibit of 17 women in her breast cancer support group.

Dresch said all the women photographed for the exhibit had made the decision to undergo a mastectomy.

Each photograph depicts a breast cancer survivor making a gesture toward her chest. Each gesture is different, and each photo conveys a different story about life after cancer.

One of the women photographed, Jane Steckler, 51, of Oceanside, said she is proud to be part of the exhibit and that she and Dresch have grown close during their journey of support for each other.

“I have many scars,” Steckler said. “Many have faded, many will never fade, inside and out. The photograph makes me feel attractive again. It makes me feel good about myself.”

Dresch gestures to her own chest. “Despite this, I’m alive, and I am here,” she said. “Whoever gets to look at this is uplifted by it, and that is the whole purpose of this exhibit.”

She was diagnosed with ductal carcinoma in situ, a growth within a milk duct, which is the most common form of noninvasive breast cancer.

After her diagnosis, Dresch’s doctors recommended removal of both breasts, a bilateral mastectomy. Her grandmother had breast cancer and Dresch has the BRCA gene, an indication she is genetically predisposed to the disease.

In August 2009, she met with an aesthetic plastic surgeon, Dr. Randall S. Feingold in Great Neck, who specializes in breast reconstruction for cancer patients who have had mastectomies.

“Kim, like most women, was nervous about how her body might have to be changed,” Feingold said. “She was unsure if she would ever be comfortable with herself again.”

“It’s very difficult to decide to take your breasts,” said Dresch, who is self-publishing a book of the photographs to raise money for breast cancer research. “But what other decision would one make to save their life, and to save their body?”

Today, she strives for breast cancer awareness, and chooses to see the glass as half-full. She leads an active life – sailing, painting, walking and photographing. And she does it all with what she calls a positive “atti-boob.”

“Is it [cancer] everything? No,” she said. “It’s a part of my life. It’s changed me. I love myself more because of it. I give more of myself now.”

Three-year-old Jake Brunette got on Flight 1225 at LaGuardia Airport on Saturday and landed at the North Pole.

For the Long Island City boy, his 17 minutes aboard the “flight” run by US Airways seemed to zoom by – especially when compared with the four hours he spent Friday at Schneider Children’s Hospital for the complete blood transfusion he must have every three weeks.

Jake – who has diamond blackfan anemia, a rare form of cancer – was among 50 patients from the hospital’s pediatric oncology center and their family members who boarded the US Airways’ Airbus 321 for the holiday-themed “fantasy flight.”

After the jet’s pilot, Capt. Jim Flanigan, taxied from Gate 21 along Runway 4, the children and their loved ones arrived at Terminal C, where they were met by Santa and Mrs. Claus, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, elves and toy soldiers.

“We do all this for the kids, but it’s really never enough,” said Rich Galante, of New Hyde Park, a licensed clinical social worker at the hospital who has organized the annual event for the past several years. “This is a really wonderful opportunity for them to see how loved they are.”

US Airways provided food and entertainment for the day. Christmas music played as volunteers painted the children’s faces, decorated their T-shirts and served them cotton candy and popcorn.

Airline workers dressed up in antlers and Christmas hats.

Natalie Gayle Policart, 34, a customer service agent for US Airways, wore a toy soldier costume and hat. She rode on the plane with the 184 passengers and spent the flight walking up and down the decorated aisle singing Christmas carols with the children.

“This is my first year working here, and I am having fun,” said Policart, who lives in Charlotte, N.C. “The kids are really happy. That is what’s important.”

As the children and their relatives left the plane and entered “Santa Land,” the strains of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” played over the public address system. The kids played under balloon arches as Santa Claus handed out candy canes and gave them Christmas gifts donated by US Airways.

Joe Cardimen, of Pittsburgh, who has dressed up as Santa for two years and whose wife works for the airline, said he was honored to again be a part of the experience.

“When you come away from this, you have no aches and no pains,” Cardimen said, speaking through his white beard. “It’s all about the children.”

Melissa Eichele, 34, of Levittown, said she was grateful that her son was invited on the fantasy flight. Tanner, 2, had surgery after he was diagnosed in September with a brain tumor.

“It’s funny, this is his first time going on a plane, and he’s going to the North Pole,” Eichele said as held her smiling, blue-eyed son in her arms. “It’s just so wonderful to see these kids happy.”

Parsa Karimi went to Melville Cemetery on Friday, hoping to find his uncle’s gravestone was not among the dozens damaged in an act of vandalism.

Karimi, 30, of Farmingdale, froze in the nearly 200-year-old cemetery when he saw the stone had been knocked over – and he was just as upset that a cemetery official didn’t tell him about it.

“It’s like he died all over again,” Karimi said, his eyes fixed on the toppled gravestone. “I know it’s a small cemetery, but make some effort.”

Suffolk police detectives are investigating the desecration of the headstones, which was reported to police Thursday morning. The headstones were knocked over sometime between Tuesday and Wednesday, police said.

More than 100 stones remained damaged Friday on the 17-acre property on Sweet Hollow Road, said Raymond DeVine, the superintendent of the Melville Cemetery.

DeVine said he informed Karimi and others who inquired that they would have to go to the cemetery and find out themselves if their loved ones’ headstones were damaged.

“We can’t sit on the phone all day and call a hundred people,” DeVine said. “This is a one-person office.”

After hearing about the vandalism on the local news, Karimi, a physical therapist, called the cemetery’s office.

DeVine said he informed Karimi and other concerned family members that the grave site and stones were personal property, and the cemetery was not responsible. DeVine told victims they would have to file a homeowners’ insurance claim.

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“I keep staring at the gravestone, hoping it will just fix itself,” Karimi said.

Brian O’Neill, president of Stone Unlimited Inc., which made some of the headstones that were damaged, said some of the granite stones weigh more than 3,000 pounds.

O’Neill spent Friday afternoon walking through each plot, counting the toppled stones. He counted 88.

The damaged headstones varied in size and age, and some were so worn their markings were illegible.

“Usually around Halloween you see five or eight down, but nothing like this,” O’Neill said. “This is what they consider fun?”

Shortly after Karimi’s uncle, Djafar Hamzeh, 62, died Aug. 20, 2008, Karimi recalled one evening visit to the cemetery interrupted by flashlights and laughter. He yelled at the group of kids, and they scurried away, he said.

DeVine, superintendent for the past 17 years, said vandalism on cemetery property occurs on occasion, but “never like this.”

Police said one person could not have done all that damage.

Karimi plans to visit his uncle’s plot again this weekend, this time with several friends to see if the headstone still is on the ground.

“I guess,” he said, “we’re gonna try to put it back up ourselves.”

The lobby of Grandell Rehabilitation & Nursing Center in Long Beach filled with laughter when nurses placed candles on Goldie Steinberg’s birthday cake Friday – they were 100 candles short.

Steinberg, who turned 109 Friday, took a breath and began blowing out the nine candles – one at a time. With every breath, applause filled the room.

“I want to wish everyone to get old with good health,” Steinberg said, holding a microphone provided by a hired musician. “Thank you to all the people who came to celebrate my birthday.”

Balloons dangled in the ceiling, lightly brushing the metallic-colored pumpkins as Steinberg sat in a wheelchair decorated with a birthday balloon. Seeing a nurse dancing in a lobster costume, Steinberg said, “that’s kosher.”

Steinberg’s smile was just as big as the smile on each resident and family member’s face celebrating her milestone.

“When I was in high school, I remember thinking, ‘I hope she will live to see me graduate,’ ” granddaughter Ellen Schneeweis, 45, of Denver, said. “Now I can’t believe it.”

During the celebration, Nassau County Clerk Kathleen O’Connell honored Steinberg with a certificate as an honorary citizen of Nassau County.

Born in Kishinev, Romania – present-day Chisinau, Moldova - on Oct. 30, 1900, and one of eight children, Steinberg came to the United States at age 23 after her uncle offered her and her two sisters an opportunity to leave. She started working as a dressmaker, moved into an apartment inBrooklyn and had two children with her husband, Philip Steinberg, who died in 1967. In 1932, she and her husband moved into an apartment inBrooklyn that she stayed in for 72 years – until 2004.

She moved into the Grandell facility to be closer to her daughter Ann Teicher, 67, who lives nearby.

Now Steinberg spends her free time watching the Yankees, crocheting and helping other residents. A year ago, the center’s bookkeeper, Barbara Ruderman, brought her 72-year-old mother for rehabilitation. “Goldie took care of her,” Ruderman said. “She made sure she was eating and getting up in the morning.”

“She has always been so independent,” Teicher said. “But she is always thinking about everyone else.”

Steinberg helps nonambulatory residents, pushing them in wheelchairs from here to there, nursing center employees said.

“We should give her 109 candles,” said Jennifer Kutner of Massapequa Park, Steinberg’s granddaughter-in-law. “She lived that long, she deserves it.”

Steinberg has one secret to living to be 109 – “My family,” she said with pride.

When Laura Perfetti, a fourth-grade teacher at Robins Lane Syosset Elementary School, gets dressed for Sunday’s ING New York City Marathon, she will put on her sneakers, slip into running shorts and strap on a set of antennae and ladybug wings.

After raising $17,283 for neurofibromatosis research, Perfetti, of Glen Cove, and seven other teachers will be representing Perfetti’s daughter, Julia Perfetti, 7, who was diagnosed with the disease when she was 4.

“It’s going to be a girl, and her name is Ladybug,” Perfetti’s son said seven years ago, pointing at Perfetti’s belly.

When her daughter was born with a coffee-colored birthmark on her stomach, the nickname stuck. The family was unaware that four years later, Julia’s spots would multiply and small, benign tumors would form on her toes.

In neurofibromatosis, tumors grow on nerves and produce other abnormalities, such as skin changes and bone deformities, according to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. An estimated 100,000 Americans are born with the disorder.

“With NF, your cells are going on a highway at 90 miles an hour,” Perfetti said. “Normally, they get off the highway when they are supposed to and they go at the right speed, but with NF, the cells start multiplying too fast.”

Perfetti and her family have raised more than $75,000 for research and are looking forward to the race. “It does matter that you raise money,” Perfetti said. “But it also matters that you raise awareness.”

Since Julia was diagnosed, MRIs and doctor’s visits have made her family’s life much different from before.

“All these teachers, they live with me day to day,” Perfetti said. “They are my co-workers and they see how my family is affected.”

Last June, Lori-Ann Pizzarelli, an art teacher at the school, joined with five other teachers to help support Perfetti and her fundraising. Perfetti said the seven women trained on a trail in Bethpage and together ran a half-marathon in Queens on Sept. 20.

“We always think about why we are running,” Pizzarelli said. “I think this is life-altering, what we did, and we are starting the marathon off flying.”

Photo Credit: Newsday/Jori Klein

Before Mary Carlson married David Paganini IV Saturday afternoon, she placed a veil over her newly done hair. Then she slid into a pair of firefighter pants and tied her boots.

The EMT and firefighter each climbed into the buckets of tower ladders and were lifted into the air, saying their vows as Hempstead Town Supervisor Kate Murray officiated.

More than 50 volunteer firefighters and EMTs gathered at East Meadow Fire Department’s Station Five to watch the marriage of Carlson, 55, a receptionist for the Long Island Heart Association, and Paganini, 62, a train maker at Willie’s Hobby Shop in Mineola. This is the second marriage for the two, who are from East Meadow.

Murray, who grew up with Carlson, remembers receiving the call asking her to officiate. “Before I said yes, there was just a tiny detail she wanted me to know about,” she said. “It was going to be in a bucket truck. I’m not too thrilled of heights, but I am thrilled to be here.”

Paganini became a firefighter in 2003. “I always wanted to do it, but Sept. 11 pushed me over the edge,” he said. He met Paganini at a department Christmas party and they got engaged in 2004.

Shortly after, Carlson shared the idea of a nontraditional wedding at the fire department. “This is our family,” Carlson said. “They are here no matter what.”

Saturday, Carlson made her entrance under a white arbor with her son, Andrew Carlson, 22, who pushed his uncle, William Morrison Jr., in a wheelchair. Music blared from ambulance speakers.

“Department attention,” said Bob Duggan, the department’s first lieutenant. Members presented arms, crossing three pike poles overhead, as a procession of EMTs and firefighters led Carlson and Paganini to their separate buckets.

Murray and maid of honor Kathy Martinez joined Carlson, while Paganini rode with best man Hector Canto. Sirens were sounded as Paganini leaned over to kiss Carlson.

“When the ceremony is over, I am wondering if they are going to spray them with the hose or throw rice,” said friend Marie Salemy, 62, of East Meadow.