WWII vet turning 100 gets a birthday surprise from a millennial

World War II veteran Dominick Daniel Santagata will turn 100 on August 23, and the Woodhaven, Queens native will be inundated with birthday cards from at least 100 grateful New Yorkers and their friends and family around the globe.

All thanks to a history-loving Westchester millennial who made it her mission to thank the war hero for his service — and share his remarkable story with friends.

“I’ve always had a deep appreciation for veterans. Every time I see a veteran, I go out of my way to thank them,” Dafina Celaj, 32, who lives in Millwood, New York, told The Post.

“I am always so grateful for the people who sacrificed for our freedom — especially the World War II generation,” she added.

Celaj, who works in event planning, met Santagata by chance in the parking lot of a Key Food grocery store in Pleasantville, New York, in 2021.

“She came up to me and said, ‘I noticed your license plate said veteran.’ I said, “I’m a veteran of World War II.” She said: “I’ve always wanted to meet one.” She was a wonderful person,” Santagata, who was wearing a U.S. Army hat at the time, told The Post. I said to her, ‘Thanks for reminding me. A lot of people have forgotten that.”

The pair kept in touch, through phone calls and letters, over the years. When Celaj learned Santagata was turning 100 this month, she put out a call to friends on social media, encouraging them to send Santagata a birthday card to a mailbox she opened especially for the occasion.

“To show my appreciation for his service to our country, I would like to try to get Dan 100 birthday cards for his 100th birthday,” she posted on Instagram last Thursday.

Celaj has since collected more than 60 letters from New Yorkers and people as far away as Ireland, Mexico and Switzerland.

She expects to reach 100 letters by next Friday and notes that many have been touched to learn about Santagata’s story.

“He is one of the last eyewitnesses to the greatest war in human history,” she said. “To be able to talk to someone from that time who saw it with their own two eyes is incredible.”

Celaj majored in history at Pace University in Westchester, but her appreciation for Santagata — and what he fought for — goes beyond the academic.

“I come from a family of immigrants,” said Celaj, whose father left communist Albania for the US in search of a better life.

Santagata was 17 when he enlisted in the Army in 1942. The son of Italian immigrants who moved to America in the 1920s, he was sent to Ft. Devens, Massachusetts, for three weeks of processing before going to Ft. Belvoir, Virginia, to train as a combat engineer.

“It was hard,” recalls Santagata, who now lives in Stamford, Connecticut. “But I did it and then I went to Camp Shanks in New York for a week off before we left for Europe for the war. I didn’t realize I wouldn’t see my family for over two years.”

Santagata left New York Harbor on the Queen Elizabeth with thousands of fellow soldiers for Newcastle, England in 1943. There, he cleared mines from the beaches before being stationed in Northern Ireland.

He handled explosives in the Army’s 5th Infantry Division, specializing in dismantling land mines, laying minefields and building barbed wire fences and bridges.

“I handled all kinds of explosives — the only one I didn’t handle much was dynamite, which was very dangerous,” he told The Post.

Santagata’s division began five campaigns – in Normandy, northern France, the Rhineland, the Ardennes in the Battle of the Bulge, and Central Europe under General George Patton. Through it all, his division crossed a staggering 26 rivers.

One of Santagata’s pivotal memories was when his division liberated a concentration camp in Czechoslovakia in 1945.

“I would never go near the ovens. I saw a prisoner and gave him a K ration [of emergency food]. He started to cry. I took civilian clothes and gave them to him,” he recalls.

After the war, he worked in construction for commercial buildings in New York and Connecticut. He and his late wife, Adrienne, raised two children together.

Today, Santagata is a proud grandfather of seven and great-grandfather of three.

He plans to celebrate his birthday over ice cream cake with his family and Celaj, who will read the heartfelt thank you note she has put together.

Turning 100 feels surreal, Santagata said.

“I never thought he would make it. I made it to 75, maybe,” he said. “I feel very lucky.”

Those wishing to wish the veteran a 100th birthday can send cards to: Dan Santagata; PO Box 33; Pleasantville, NY 10570.