JOE VACARRO: AMERICAN LEGION POST 56 VETERANS STILL SERVING THEIR COUNTRY & COMMUNITY

American Legion Post 56 has reported a busy series of events over the past few weeks that included hosting 16 wounded warriors of the Freedom Hunters for a glorious day of fishing onboard the Ms. Jennifer. This wonderful day included breakfast and lunch at Post 56. The Post also conducted their annual Flag Retirement Ceremony where unserviceable American flags are disposed of in a dignified manner in accordance with the U.S. Flag Code.

Post elections at this Cheriton Post saw the election of Commander Bill Stramm, 1st Vice Commander Glenn Purvis, 2nd Vice Commander Larry McCluskey, 3rd Vice Commander Barry Taylor, Adjutant Dave Grough, Finance Officer Tony Jette, Historian Roger Munz, Chaplain Wilson Leggett, Sergeant-at-Arms JC Carstens, Service Officer Bill Stramm and Trustees Joe Vaccaro, Dave Steward, Bob Roche and John Schulz.

In addition to all of this, Post 56 is sponsoring 7 young men to attend Boys State at Radford

University from June 19 – 25. These young men went through a vigorous screening process to attend this 2016 session.

Boy’s State is one of the American Legion’s most respected educational programs of government instruction for high school students where maximum participation is required from each young man who attends this prestigious program. Local HS juniors are selected from within the community based on their leadership potential, academic skills, sports involvement, community contributions and local recommendations. Virginia Boys State is a leadership action program, designed to develop a working knowledge of the structure of government and to impress upon the citizen the fact that our government is just what we make it.

Along the way they will have the opportunity to learn the political process. Each level of government will be run by those delegates who are elected to serve. Instruction will be presented on the law and court system, parliamentary procedure and Virginia political history.

The young men from the shore who will attend this year’s session are Jack Salm, Jake McClaskey, Liam

Kelly, Brandon Tankard, Zach Lingle from Broadwater Academy and Taylor Shreaves and Wayne Bell Jr. from Northampton High School. Commander Bill Stramm and Sergeant-at-Arms JC Carstens will return as counselors for this 2016 session.