{"id":71267,"date":"2021-05-30T22:30:00","date_gmt":"2021-05-31T06:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/rain-does-little-to-dampen-larger-than-usual-memorial-day-ceremony\/"},"modified":"2021-05-30T22:30:00","modified_gmt":"2021-05-31T06:30:00","slug":"rain-does-little-to-dampen-larger-than-usual-memorial-day-ceremony","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/rain-does-little-to-dampen-larger-than-usual-memorial-day-ceremony\/","title":{"rendered":"Rain does little to dampen larger-than-usual Memorial Day ceremony"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t\t\t

A dismal day didn’t intrude on the solemnity of the holiday as the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 5559 honored the dead during a ceremony at Evergreen Cemetery.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

A sizable crowd attended the ceremony as a Coast Guard color guard displayed the colors in the steady rain.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

“It’s an honor to do it,” said VFW quartermaster Dan McCrummen in an interview. “It’s our duty of us veterans surviving to remember those who didn’t come home with us.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

“The crowd was much bigger than I expected,” McCrummen said.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

\"A<\/a>

A Coast Guard color guard parades the colors at a Memorial Day ceremony held by the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 5559 at Evergreen Cemetery on May 31, 2021. (Michael S. Lockett \/ Juneau Empire)<\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

The ceremony was temporarily suspended last year due to pandemic concerns, but McCrummen said the post had worked with local radio stations to put the word out this year.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

“We’ve been doing this for more years than I’ve been here,” McCrummen said. “A lot of people just know that it happens.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

[Remembering the fallen: Rain doesn’t keep Memorial Day observers away<\/a>]<\/ins><\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

Randy Ruaro, acting chief of staff for the governor’s office, spoke at the ceremony, honoring a Vietnam veteran he had known growing up in Ketchikan. Ruaro also spoke briefly about Senior Chief Petty Officer Shannon Kent, an intelligence specialist killed in a suicide bombing in Syria in 2019.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

“She didn’t have to go on that mission, but she did anyway to help our country,” Ruaro said. “Veterans are super important to ourcommunity.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

\"Veterans<\/a>

Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 5559 quartermaster Dan McCrummen salutes the wreath laid at the foot of the flagpole during a Memorial Day ceremony at Evergreen Cemetery on May 31, 2021. (Michael S. Lockett \/ Juneau Empire)<\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

Memorial Day is about honoring those who went off to foreign places the service and the country and didn’t return, said David Carroll, VFW junior vice commander.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

“This isn’t about us, it’s for them,” Carroll said. “Each year there are more names on that list. And for those who came home but lost their battle later.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t

• Contact reporter Michael S. Lockett at (757) 621-1197 or mlockett@juneauempire.com.<\/em><\/p>\n\t\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Many gathered at Evergreen Cemetery to honor America’s war dead. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":534,"featured_media":71268,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":9,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,4],"tags":[75,365],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-71267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-home","category-news","tag-local-news","tag-veterans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/534"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71267"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=71267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}