Some people forget that Memorial Day is about more than a long weekend to kick off the summer. Clay resident Glenn Sotherden is not one of those people.
Since 1984 he has been putting flags on the graves of close to 1500 veterans at six local cemeteries, including the Pine Plains Cemetery in Clay, off of Henry Clay Blvd.
This year there are 25 new veteran graves that will be marked with flags. In the past few years, the numbers have climbed dramatically due to the WW2 vets aging and dying. The flags, which are distributed by a veterans’ group called the Memorial Association of Syracuse, are limited. This year the allotment was only for 720 flags, but luckily Sotherden has been planning ahead all along. Each year the flags are removed by July 10 and stored safely in his house so that they can be used the following year. He single-handedly ensures that everyone entitled to a flag receives one.
Many of the graves at Pine Plains are unmarked because although the Veterans Administration will provide markers for free, they cannot do so without notification from the next of kin, which is sometimes not possible. Those that are marked date back as far as the Revolutionary and Civil Wars. There are also graves of non-local veterans who were given plots at no cost, though no one really knows how or why they wound up in Clay.
“I like it here because it is so peaceful,” Sotherden said. The care he takes in his work probably gives the veterans who rest there peace as well.
There will be a ceremony open to the public at 10 a.m. on May 25 at the Pine Plains Cemetery to commemorate the holiday.
May
05
Flags for the fallen on Memorial Day
Melissa Renahan 05/05/09
CATEGORY: General Society