LINCOLN, Maine — Veterans Day in Lincoln is a thoughtful holiday.
Besides the honor guards and their rifle salutes, the gatherings of American Legion Post 77, VFW Post 1438 and Marine Corps League members, the speeches and the thanks proffered to all American veterans who fought in this country’s wars, people said they think about what Veterans Day means to them.
Arrayed around the Lincoln Veterans Memorial shortly before noon Monday, about 150 people gathered to honor the town’s veterans, and to them Veterans Day meant different things.
To Roger Morrison, it was a chance to wonder if kids today could understand what life was like during World War II.
“When I was a senior in high school,” Morrison said Wednesday, “it didn’t occur to anyone to think about what to do for a living. That didn’t even exist. If you didn’t enlist, you were drafted. There was only the war to think about.”
Just 18, the Lincoln resident recalled how he boarded a midnight train to take him into the Navy where, as a Seabee — a member of a construction battalion — Morrison didn’t stop traveling until he was in the Philippines helping free the islands from four years of brutal Japanese occupation.
“The thing I remember the most was the homesickness,” the 83-year-old recalled. “Aside from maybe a trip to Rhode Island that I took when I was about this tall, I don’t think I had ever been anywhere, and this time, my mother wasn’t going with me.”
Standing a few feet from Morrison, one of those kids of today, 8-year-old Thresa Adams, saw little more than the hundreds of names neatly etched into the memorial. Fascinated with the names, she kept counting them.
State Rep. Jeff Gifford considered how his father, Phillip Gifford, and his father’s brother, Earl Gifford, fought as U.S. Army infantrymen after D-Day.
“Think about it,” Gifford said. “People like my dad, who grew up in Lee, had to leave school in the eighth grade to work on their farms and then, when he was maybe 17 or 18, he got drafted and had to go to Europe to fight a war. Back in those days, a trip to Lincoln was a big deal — to Bangor was unheard of. And they were kids.
“I often think about it,” Gifford said. “It’s a fascinating thing.”
State Sen. Elizabeth Schneider thanked veterans for their sacrifices and pondered how their shared experiences made them special.
“Through all of their struggles there are treasures found, great bonds of camaraderie which are everlasting,” she said. “A unity in caring to preserve our democracy, our freedom, and having pride in serving others are the shining pearls of strength of character which are forged throughout these difficult periods.”
An after-school teacher with the KidCare America program at Community Evangel Temple of Lincoln, Michelle Russell of Chester brought Adams to the ceremony because she thought it important to give her something more than a history lesson.
As part of her efforts, Russell had her class write letters to an imaginary World War I veteran. The letters, she said, were full of questions about tactile issues: What do you eat? How do you live? Life almost 100 years ago was clearly a huge mystery to the children, and the sacrifices the veterans made appeared even more mysterious, Russell said.
“I don’t know if they understand the sacrifice,” Russell said, “but they should. It’s important.”
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