Students hold Saluting Our Veterans day at Messalonskee Middle School

Veteran Tina Richard, right, of Clinton, with keynote speaker U.S. Sen. Susan Collins.

On November 4, students at Messalonskee Middle School held Saluting Our Veterans Day tribute. The ceremony began with a light breakfast, and the veterans chatting with the students. The veterans then moved to the auditorium accompanied arm-in-arm by a student under a canope of American flags. The Messalonskee High School band played America the Beautiful march, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. A slide show was then presented of the students’ interviews at the Cole Lane Transportation Museum, in Bangor, and many poems were read about what freedom meant to the students. U.S. Senator Susan Collins was the keynote speaker. Collins stressed the fact that veterans possess two distinguishing qualities of integrity and humbleness. VFW Post #1285 announced the winner of the Patriot’s Pen Essay Contest, which was followed by a moment of silence and the playing of Taps. The veterans were then escorted from the auditorium at the end of the ceremony with much appreciation and thanks from the students.

Students form a canopy of American flags as military veterans are escorted into the auditorium by students

Text and photos courtesy of Tina Richard