AUBURN -- Tony DeTomaso celebrated his 20th birthday in a ditch in France while serving with the 299th Engineer Combat Battalion. Next week, he'll be celebrating his 84th birthday in Auburn, which now has a street that officially bears the name of that company.

DeTomaso and fellow 299th member Dominick DeBenedetto were both present Friday during a ceremony commemorating the battalion's role in the Allied invasion at Normandy during World War II.

During the event, state and local officials announced that a portion of Genesee Street in Auburn would be named after the group to honor the six Auburn residents who fought in the battle. The 299th Engineer Combat Battalion Memorial Highway will run from the Market Street Park to Veterans Memorial Park at James Street.

"I'm glad that we can see all these people who came," DeTomaso said of the 75-plus crowd that attended the ceremony.

The ceremony is held every year around the anniversary of D-Day on June 6. It takes place in front of the county office building, where there is a monument dedicated to the battalion.

Auburn City Council unanimously passed a resolution Thursday at its weekly meeting to designate the road a memorial highway. The council had previously voted to name a stretch of the Arterial after the battalion. However, that portion of road had already been dedicated as the Purple Heart Highway by the state transportation department.

City Councilor William Graney said after the ceremony that Genesee Street is a perfect location anyway, as it runs along the city's war memorial.

"This is their hometown," Graney said. "It's a long time coming."

Many of the men in the 299th Engineer Combat Battalion were from Cayuga County and upstate New York. Nicholas DeAngelis, John Spinelli, Leo Indelicato, Tom Phillips, Claude Brown and Lawrence Roberts, all from Auburn, died during the invasion.

Read the full report in Saturday's edition of The Citizen.