How It Works · Service Honored

From the record

Exactly what the DD-214 says, field by field
Dates, rank, and campaign credit as the form lists them
Where their unit was, and when
What a decoration was given for at the time they received it
What a duty station was, and what happened there
Published unit histories covering the years they served if available

From your family

Your stories, the way you were told them
Names, dates and places inside those stories
What they said about their experiences
Who's standing next to them in a photograph
What they were like when they came home
Things they may have only told you once

We can't verify family or personal stories. Official personnel records only hold ranks, dates and assignments.

So we write them the way you tell them, mark on the page where they came from, and leave them alone. The service facts are different. Those we pull straight off the DD-214 document and match to the published history. If that record doesn't support a line, the line doesn't get published. A rank, a unit or a decoration that appears only in a family story stays out.

Four steps

Send us the documents,
we take care of the rest.

One page holds more than most families expect or even knew. Dates, rank, every station, every decoration, specialty, classes, the units they were assigned to and more. We only use the fields that describe their service.

This is the only official document we need. The photographs come from your collection. We blend and seamlessly integrate this content into an inspiring video about the hero in your life.

Straight from the record19 AUG 2026

DD Form 214 · Certificate of Release or Discharge from Active Duty Member Copy 4

1. Name (Last, First, Middle)WHEELER, DANIEL R.Verified

2. Dept., Component & BranchARMY / RAVerified

3. Social Security No.•••••••••

4a. Grade, Rate or RankSGT E-5Verified

5. Date of Birth09 FEB 1947

7a. Place of EntryDAYTON, OHIO

8a. Last Duty Assignment & Major CommandCO B, 2D BN, 28TH INF
1ST INFANTRY DIVISIONMatched to unit history

12. Record of ServiceENTERED 14 NOV 1966
SEPARATED 11 APR 1969

13. Decorations, Medals, Badges, Citations and Campaign Ribbons Awarded or AuthorizedPURPLE HEART · COMBAT INFANTRYMAN BADGE · NATIONAL DEFENSE SERVICE MEDAL ·
VIETNAM SERVICE MEDAL W/ 2 BRONZE SERVICE STARSMatched to award criteria

Fields we use to build a script.

01

Upload the DD-214

Upload a photo or scan and cover the Social Security number on screen before it’s sent. We keep your information for 30 days after the tribute is delivered and then delete it. No DD-214 in the house? Here’s how to get one for free.

02

Tell us who they are

Photographs, however faded or badly kept, are ok. We will clean them up. Up to 10 can be included in the tribute. Tell us why they joined, who they came home to, that one story that always got retold at dinner. Tell us as much as you would like or a few sentences is plenty to work with. Tell us how to say their name, too, and anything you’d rather we leave out.

03

We put it all together

The record is read and verified, the narration is written and revised, and a person checks every date and decoration against the form. If we get a fact wrong, tell us inside 30 days and we fix it for free.

04

You approve the proof

Before anyone else sees it, you watch a private proof on our site. Approve it, or tell us what we missed and we fix it and send a new proof. Once you approve, it goes to their email the morning of the day you selected.

Behind the writing

The history part
is already written.

Unit and campaign histories get written once, by people who sat down with the published record. When a form comes in reading 2nd Battalion, 28th Infantry, that block is already waiting. They get written in plain language, the way somebody would actually say it out loud. Your family's half is the only part written from scratch every time, because it's the only part nobody else could write.

Not this:
"The 1st Infantry Division conducted search and destroy operations in III Corps during 1967."

This:
"The Big Red One worked the ground north of Saigon, which mostly meant rubber plantations, and rubber plantations are a bad place to be shot at."

Three things we won't do

Videos are made with respect
and preserve dignity.

Make a photograph move

There are tools now that will take a still photo and make it blink, smile, turn and look at the camera. Families find it unsettling. We perform gentle photo restorations and pan the camera across the pictures instead. The subject of the photograph stays exactly the same as when they stood there.

Put them in a battle

Personnel records don't say who was in which fight. They never have, at any level of access. If their unit was somewhere and they were in it, we'll tell you that much and then we'll stop. We don't do battle reenactments or simulate heroic deeds.

Charge you for your own records

The DD-214 is free from the National Archives to every veteran or to next of kin. Older files require a fee that you pay directly to the government. We’ll show you the quickest way to get your documents and help you navigate the complex archive structure, but you pay us nothing for your records.

Two sources.The record and the family.