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Health & Fitness

Veterans of VFW Post 4393 Retire Flags on Presidents Day

VFW Members meet to honorably retire flags on President's day.

At just after 9:00 AM this morning Kevin Phelps and myself met at the home of member Charles Wells in Dennison.

I opened our informal ceremony with these remarks.

"Gentlemen, we have presented here these Flags of our Country, which have been inspected and condemned as unserviceable. They have reached their present state in a proper service of tribute, memory, and love.

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"A Flag may be a flimsy bit of printed gauze or a beautiful banner of the finest silk.  Its intrinsic value may be trifling or great; but its real value is beyond price, for it is a precious symbol of all that we and our comrades have worked for, lived for, and died for—a free nation of free men and women, true to the faith of the past, devoted to the ideals and practice of Justice, Freedom, and Democracy.

"Let these faded Flags of our Country be retired and destroyed with respectful and honorable rites and their places be taken by bright new Flags.  Let no grave of our dead soldiers or sailors be unhonored or unmarked."

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After this was said the three of us present respectfully placed several flags one at a time in to a very hot fire to destroy the flag honorably.

For information on flag ettiquette please visit our website: vfw4393.org

Flags are properly retired several times a year by members of the VFW and American Legion. So if you have a worn or faded flag please feel free to drop your retired flag off at a post near you.

We plan to hold a formal flag retirement ceremony in June for Flag Day, watch for further information right here on Northfield Patch.

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