Letter To The Editor By Jordan Baer
This December 14th, Oak Hill & Locust Hill Cemeteries will be participating in the Wreaths Across America program thanks to cemetery superintendent Chris Cooke and local event coordinator and volunteer Betsy Fulton. As a part of my goal of making our city cemeteries a part of the lives of all local residents, honoring our deceased veterans is the perfect way to begin this process. When Mr. Cooke brought the program to my attention, I couldn’t help but feel like this would be yet another great opportunity for residents from all sides of town and all sides of the political compass to come together and help pay tribute to our veterans buried in our city cemeteries.
The Wreaths Across America organization began in 1992 by Mr. Morrill Worcester. As the owner of the Harrington, Maine based Worcester Wreath Company, Morrill had many wreaths left over from the holiday season. Inspired by a trip he took to Arlington National Cemetery when he was a boy, Morrill arranged for the wreaths to be sent to Arlington National Cemetery. Not only did he send the wreaths to Arlington, he also had them placed in an older part of the cemetery that had been receiving fewer and fewer visits as the years passed by. You can read more about his story at the Wreaths Across America website: http://www.wreathsacrossamerica.org/
When I heard the story about Morrill, I couldn’t help but feel like our local movement to return reverence to our cemeteries runs parallel to the hopes and aspirations that Mr. Worcester is currently fulfilling. Like Arlington National Cemetery, we need to pay tribute to all of our deceased veterans whether they are buried in the new sections of the two cemeteries or laid to rest deep in the back parts of them. For this reason, I am asking for help from both local residents as well as local leaders in raising the proper amount of funds to place a wreath on all veteran head stones on December 14th.
About this time, most of you are probably saying to yourself, “that’s great but we’re only a few weeks away from Christmas and I just don’t have the money to make a huge contribution.†As someone who has always lived paycheck to paycheck, I certainly understand and sympathize with your concerns. Luckily, Wreaths Across America has made it affordable for everyone to sponsor a wreath.
Sponsorship of a wreath is just $15.00, that’s less than a dollar a day between now and Christmas. You can sign up and pay for your wreath sponsorship at the Wreaths Across America store: http://www.waastore.com/ While at the store, you can also purchase a wide variety of other things such as pins, flags, and Christmas cards just to name a few. When purchasing a wreath sponsorship, please note that the code for Oak Hill Cemetery is “INOHCE†and the code for the Civil Air Patrol squadron who is hosting the event is “INCAP220″. Also, anyone who sponsors a wreath may post a thank you article to our veterans on my blog agraveinjustice.blogspot.com.
I appreciate Mr. Chris Cooke and Mrs. Betsy Fulton as well the Civil Air Patrol squadron for bringing Wreaths Across America to our Evansville cemeteries. And, I would also appreciate it if you the residents and city leaders of Evansville and Vanderburgh County would remember our veterans during the holiday season by sponsoring a wreath for a veteran headstone this December 14th.
This sounds like a good and wise use of extra holiday wreaths that would normally be discarded. I’m not very good with ordering things online but I’ll make sure my wife buys us a wreath or two.
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