Glacier View School students honor Veterans at celebration
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RONAN – Students at Glacier View School spent a few months studying military history and talking to veterans to create a thankyou program for veterans held Thursday, Nov. 9.
“We wanted to say ‘thank you’ for your service to the veterans,” said Glacier View student Noah Carlson, 12.
Volunteer Sarew Robinson said this is the fifth year the school has organized the program. It started as a community service project with six students and grew to include three times that number.
“We spend two months getting ready, learning songs and skits, and talking to the veterans at the Ronan VFW,” Robinson said.
She said she hopes the students come away with two lessons: “We want them to learn respect for veterans and respect for freedom. And we want the veterans to know that they are not forgotten.”
Several veterans from the Ronan VFW attended the event along with parents and community members. The Ronan VFW posted the colors during the opening ceremony. After that, students sang the “Star Spangled Banner” and other songs and performed a skit reenacting some of the things American soldiers might have experienced in past wars to the song “All Gave Some, Some Gave All.”
Army Veteran Dave Peck was invited to give the opening prayer. He said it wasn’t popular to be a veteran when he first got out of the military about 40 years ago.
“It was about ten years ago that I was first thanked for my service,” he said.
He was proud of the students for holding the event and honoring veterans, and he took a moment to thank the students and his fellow veterans.
Peck also told a few stories about eating food rations during his service time that didn’t taste so great, and he showed the kids a pair of homemade glasses he made out of cardboard. He said the Army taught soldiers to make a similar pair in case anyone forgot the glasses they needed to protect their eyes from the blinding reflection of light coming off of snow.
Veteran Bill Austin brought his service dog, JP, to the event. Students were impressed with the dog’s size. Austin said the dog stands just over six-feet tall on his hind legs and weighs 145 pounds.
Austin went on stage to answer a few questions from student Noah Carlson. Carlson quickly asked how the dog is trained to help.
“He is strong enough to get me going, and he reminds me to take my medication,” Austin said. He explained that the dog is trained to remind him to get up and take his pills.
Austin said he was in two branches of the military. He served in the Army and the National Guard. He was discharged in 2011 after “being too close to a blast” that left him with a traumatic brain injury, post-traumatic stress disorder, and mobility issues.
Austin talked about the Montana Wounded Warriors and said it was a “magnificent organization” that helped him take a few hunting trips. “They get you up in the morning and you hunt hard,” he said.
He finished by saying that he can relate to Peck’s speech about military food not being so great. He remembers being really hungry out in the field and only having a piece of fruitcake left in his rations. He said he couldn’t eat it, so he threw it out.
“A field mouse wouldn’t even eat it,” he said.
The students invited the veterans and others attending the program to a lunch that was much better than fruitcake. A few of the older students at the school helped make the lunch.
World War II Navy Air Veteran Jim Sivelle said he felt “honored” by the program the students created. He took a few minutes before eating lunch to explain that he joined the service in 1945 after being given a deferment to finish high school.
He became an aviation mechanic and flew search and rescue operations over the ocean during the war. “We would go out when planes or ships went down or after Kamikaze attacks,” he said.
Sivelle remembers being shipped to Pear Harbor in Hawaii after the Japanese attack.
“I always say I shipped out with heroes,” he said. He remembers hearing stories of soldiers going out in the water through burning oil after the harbor was bombed to save people.
Later, he was on a ship that went to the Battle of Iwo Jima and then the Battle of Okinawa. He said he wouldn’t take a million dollars for his military experience, but he was glad when his time was finished, so he could get home and get a higher paying job.
At 92 years of age, he has one more thing to accomplish. “I’m going to be the last standing veteran from World War II,” he said with a smile as he turned to go eat lunch.
Glacier View students involved in the program include: Zabrea Cook-Clairmont, Zoe Foster, Ali Cooksley, Ella Cooksley, Star Vaughn, Landon Cornell, Sianna Robinson, Josiah Lopez, Zachary Scott, Aeryka Hunold, Martina Hunold, Jasper Jungwirth, Ben Carlson, Nissa Rodda, Sunny Robinson, Andrew Scott, Athena Rorvik, Katie Croft, Ellie Lindeman, Noah Carlson, Cheyenne Farrow and Kaylynn Wolf.
