120 flags in Ephrata
American Legion Post 28 commander Kimberly Thomas, right, reads names of veterans during a Memorial Day ceremony in Ephrata. Post 28 Auxiliary president Mardi Carroll, left, and former Post 28 commander Mike Montaney, center, listen.
CHERYL SCHWEIZER/COLUMBIA BASIN HERALD
American Legion Post 28 auxiliary president Mardi Carroll, center, reads the names of veterans commemorated on the flags in the Aisle of Flags in the Ephrata Cemetery at a Memorial Day ceremony. She is flanked by Post 28 Commander Kimberly Thomas, left, and former commander Mike Montaney, right.
The honor guard from Post 28 prepares to fire a salute to commemorate veterans during Memorial Day ceremonies at the Ephrata Cemetery.
EPHRATA — Kimberly Thomas, commander of American Legion Post 28 in Ephrata, and the auxiliary president Mardi Carroll read off the names of the people commemorated in the Aisle of Flags set up to commemorate Memorial Day.
“For those of you who weren’t counting, there were 120 of them,” said former Post 28 commander Mike Montaney when the two women had finished.
There was something about the flags that not everybody might know, he added.
“Each flag once draped the coffin of a veteran,” he said.
Family members and friends had donated them for the Aisle of Flags, he said, and in some cases the flag might be the last memento of the veteran.
Thomas and Carroll read their names, the time in which they served and their military branch. The list was a history of more than a century of military service, and a record of changing times.
The man who served with Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders in the Spanish-American War. The man who died in France and is buried there; his family received the flag from his coffin. The man who won a Bronze Star. The man who helped feed Berlin during the Berlin Airlift. The man in the Silent Service, the Navy’s submarine arm.
The list included veterans of World War I and World War II, Korea, Vietnam. They represented all branches of the service, and some of them were in multiple branches. They served in the Army and Navy, Marines and Coast Guard. They served in the U.S. Air Force and its predecessor the U.S. Army Air Corps. They were enlisted men and women, officers and non-commissioned officers.
Representatives of Post 28 and Karneesta chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution presented wreaths in their honor, and an honor guard fired a 21-gun salute and played Taps. Post 28 members have identified 480 veterans in the Ephrata Cemetery, Mike Montaney said, including four Civil War veterans.
Post 28 Auxiliary member Jane Montaney said many of them survived the conflicts and came home to live the rest of their lives, but some didn’t. Some of them died young, she said.
Memorial Day is a chance to remember them and their service, she said.
“It’s not about war. It’s about people,” she said.
Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at education@columbiabasinherald.com.
