A Memorial Day ceremony at the Stillwater Veterans Memorial will begin at 9:00 a.m., Monday, May 31st to honor St. Croix Valley area casualties of war. The ceremony will include music by the Croix Chordsmen and “Taps” performed by Stillwater Area High School students. A flag raising and flyover by the T-6 Thunder Flight Team is planned for noon.
The Stillwater Veterans Memorial honors on Memorial Day and every day the 125 former students of Stillwater schools who have been killed in all our nation's wars from the Civil War through Vietnam. Of that number 8 are still missing and 23 never returned home and are interred in 13 American Battle Monument Cemeteries throughout the world. In the words of President Ronald Reagan, “We see (them) in our mind as old and wise. We see them as something like the Founding Fathers, grave and grey haired. But most of them were boys when they died, and they gave up two lives - the one they were living and the one they would have lived. When they died, they gave up their chance to be husbands and fathers and grandfathers. They gave up their chance to be revered old men. They gave up everything for our country, for us.”
In their honor and remembrance, four T-6 WWII aircraft will be overflying in formation dropping smoke over the Stillwater Veterans Memorial (the former Stillwater High School) and present day Junior High School and Senior High School at 12:00 noon on Memorial Day, May 31st. In the words of Eleanor Roosevelt in her WWII prayer, “Lest I continue in my complacent ways, help me to remember that somewhere, somehow out there a man died for me today I must then ask and answer am I worth dying for.”
The Stillwater Veterans Memorial is at Third and Pine Streets in Stillwater. While some seating will be provided, attendees are encouraged to bring their own lawn chairs. For more information, please visit Stillwater Veterans Memorial at http://www.stillwaterveteransmemorial.org and https://www.facebook.com/stillwater.veterans.memorial/
Come out and honor our local and national heroes who have given their last full measure in support of our country’s freedoms and for democratic ideals around the world.
Contact Court Melin at info@stillvetmem.org 651-344-6245
