Beyond Lt. Dan: Gary Sinise Reflects on Grief, Gratitude, and a Life Devoted to Honoring America’s Heroes

American Thought Leaders

The Epoch Times

Government, News, Politics

4.9 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 25 May 2025

⏱️ 65 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

“Service … it’s a great healer for a broken heart. It helped me a lot through our fight for our son, and the difficulties and the challenges of fighting for him and then losing him,” says Gary Sinise.

An Emmy Award-winning actor, producer, director, and musician, Sinise has dedicated his life to supporting America’s active-duty military, veterans, first responders, and their families.

The Gary Sinise Foundation has raised over $500 million in support of these communities, and Sinise has won many awards for his humanitarian contributions, including the Presidential Citizen Medal, the second-highest civilian honor in the United States.

In this episode, Sinise reflects on his three decades of service, from building dozens of specially modified homes for wounded veterans and first responders to playing nearly 600 concerts with the Lt. Dan band (named after his Forrest Gump character) at military bases across the United States and overseas.

Sinise’s son McCanna Anthony “Mac” Sinise died last year at age 33 after a five-year battle with a rare bone cancer called chordoma. Before he passed, he was able to record an entire album of music that he’d begun in college. It’s titled “Resurrection & Revival.”

Mac’s story and his father’s full tribute to his son can be found here on the Gary Sinise Foundation website: https://www.garysinisefoundation.org/mac-tribute

Transcript

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0:00.0	The band has done almost 600 concerts over the last 20 years or so on military bases
0:08.0	all over the country and overseas.
0:10.0	And it's a good feeling.
0:12.0	It's a good feeling.
0:13.0	Service, I always say this, it's a great healer for a broken heart.
0:19.0	And it helped me a lot through our fight for our son
0:24.8	and the difficulties and the challenges of fighting for him
0:28.1	and then losing him.
0:29.1	And I didn't stop doing the service work during that time.
0:33.0	It was the thing that was helping me with our own battle at home.
0:37.4	In this episode, I'm sitting down with award-winning actor, producer, director, director. the thing that was helping me with our own battle at home.
0:42.8	In this episode, I'm sitting down with award-winning actor, producer, director, and musician Gary Seneese, perhaps best known for playing Lieutenant Dan in Forrest Gump.
0:47.7	He's dedicated his life to supporting America's active-duty military, veterans, first responders,
0:53.7	and their families.
0:55.0	In 2008, he received the Presidential Citizen Medal for his humanitarian contributions.
1:00.0	Anybody who's going through a difficult time, the loss of a loved one, parents who lose a child,
1:06.0	my heart goes out to them, and by lifting somebody else up, we lift ourselves up and there's
1:12.6	no question about it.
1:14.4	This is American Thought Leaders and I'm Yanya Kellick.
1:17.3	Gary Sinise, such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders.
1:22.3	I'm happy to be here.
1:23.3	Thank you.
	...

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