Families, political range honor veterans in Wiscasset
American Legion Post 54 of Wiscasset Auxiliary President Sandra Winters of Wiscasset places her hand to her heart as each of the morning’s other wreath-layers did at the veterans wall at the town office Veterans Day. She had just placed the auxiliary’s wreath she and Treasurer Jane LeBourdaise made days earlier. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Marion Pray, 5, of Edgecomb holds the American flag she got as the Wiscasset service’s youngest attendee. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Faye Shea, left, and Clara Wentworth talk after Shea received an honor for her work with Wentworth on the Saving Our Stars project. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Attendees laugh as the American Legion and the crowd try to figure out who gets the American flag for oldest. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
David Chase, left, his German shepherd Asia and House District 87 Rep. Jeff Hanley. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Sandra Winters, left, looks on as fellow Wiscasset resident and auxiliary officer Jane LeBourdaise points out the youngest attendee. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Warren Cossette, left, and Dave Taylor.
SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
American Legion Post 54’s John Kennedy at the hall on Bath Road. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Mary Pray with grandchildren Katy, 7, and Marion, 5, at the AL hall. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Sandra Winters of Wiscasset and Mary Ellen Barnes of Westport Island chat at the American Legion hall, site of a reception after the ceremony. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
American Legion Post 54 of Wiscasset Auxiliary President Sandra Winters of Wiscasset places her hand to her heart as each of the morning’s other wreath-layers did at the veterans wall at the town office Veterans Day. She had just placed the auxiliary’s wreath she and Treasurer Jane LeBourdaise made days earlier. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Marion Pray, 5, of Edgecomb holds the American flag she got as the Wiscasset service’s youngest attendee. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Faye Shea, left, and Clara Wentworth talk after Shea received an honor for her work with Wentworth on the Saving Our Stars project. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Attendees laugh as the American Legion and the crowd try to figure out who gets the American flag for oldest. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
David Chase, left, his German shepherd Asia and House District 87 Rep. Jeff Hanley. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Sandra Winters, left, looks on as fellow Wiscasset resident and auxiliary officer Jane LeBourdaise points out the youngest attendee. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Warren Cossette, left, and Dave Taylor.
SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
American Legion Post 54’s John Kennedy at the hall on Bath Road. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Mary Pray with grandchildren Katy, 7, and Marion, 5, at the AL hall. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Sandra Winters of Wiscasset and Mary Ellen Barnes of Westport Island chat at the American Legion hall, site of a reception after the ceremony. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Past Gardiner Area High School schoolmates David Chase of Wiscasset, with his German shepherd Asia at his side, and House District 87 Rep. Jeff Hanley, R-Pittston, shook hands and caught up Monday near the veterans wall at American Legion Post 54 of Wiscasset’s Veterans Day service.
Army veteran Chase said he is as liberal as they come. Smiling, he told the Republican lawmaker they weren’t on the same side. “But that’s OK.”
“We are today,” Hanley said, smiling back. Then they got talking about their graduating classes, Chase, 1970; Hanley, 1969.
In interviews, Hanley and some of the other 50 or so attendees said they feel it’s important to come to the observances to honor those who served or are serving. Wiscasset’s Mary Pray brought grandchildren John, 10, Katy, 8, and Marion, 5, all of Edgecomb. “I want them to know what sacrifices were made,” Pray said. They have family members who have served, and no one who has served should be forgotten, she said. Marion Pray got the American flag for youngest attendee. Later, at a reception in the post’s hall on Bath Road, her grandmother read her and her siblings the Legion’s Constitution on the wall.
At 91, Clara Wentworth, Daughters of American Revolution wreath in hand to place at the veterans wall, got the flag for oldest.
Also in the ceremony, Wentworth’s fellow volunteer on the “Save Our Stars” project, Faye Shea, got a certificate Post 54 Cmdr. Bill Cossette Jr. said he’d been trying more than a year to give her. Wentworth and Shea started a few years ago taking the stars from worn American flags and getting messages on them to give to groups who have veterans. To request stars, call 882-6219.
“Thank you very much,” Cossette told Shea in handing her the certificate, to applause.
At one point in the gathering at the Routes 1-27 intersection, a passing vehicle’s horn peeped. Speaker Wally Staples praised the turnout on the cool, gray morning. Cossette announced American Legion membership is now open to all veterans; and members said they could use donations to replace American flags ruined two weeks ago in a windstorm before they were taken down from utility poles for the season.
About 30 percent of the flags will need replacing, member Larry Rines said. Some were wrapped several times around their posts; others were found in the woods, he said. “We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us.”
Cossette said any checks to help can be made out to American Legion Post 54, with flags donation in the memo line, and mailed to American Legion Post 54, P.O. Box 214, Wiscasset, ME 04578.
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