Memorial Day Parade and Service
Manhasset American Legion Post 304 together with the Manhasset-Lakeville Fire/Water District Commissioners and Officers of the Manhasset-Lakeville Fire Department are sponsoring the 2022 Manhasset Memorial Day Parade and Service.
All Manhasset residents, their families and friends are invited to join in this remembrance of the great sacrifices of our American heroes.
Flag Planting
Post 304 and Boy Scout Troop 97 will place American flags on the graves of veterans in local cemeteries and will participate with other American Legion Posts in decorating the graves at the Long Island National Cemetery in Pinelawn.
Post 304 has also donated American flags which will be placed on the street light poles along Plandome Road.
The Parade
The Memorial Day Parade begins promptly at 10 a.m. The route of the parade will be along Plandome Road from Plandome Court to Memorial Place with excellent public viewing along the entire length.
Twenty-five organizations and six bands are scheduled to march. The Parade will include fire trucks from the Manhasset-Lakeville and Plandome Fire Departments.
During the parade, the American Legion will place a wreath at the Gold Star Monument on Plandome Road.
Parade Line-up
Those planning to march in the Parade are expected to be present, ready to march, in their designated assembly areas no later than 9:30 a.m.
Commander’s Speech
Let Us Remember Our Heroes – Memorial Day
Thirty years ago, America engaged in a new war in a volatile region. Iraq had invaded the sovereign nation of Kuwait.
Among the half-million, U.S. troops deployed to the Middle East was Army Specialist Cindy Beaudoin (pronounced bode win). A freshman at the University of Connecticut, Specialist Beaudoin enlisted in the National Guard and served as a medic with the 142nd Medical Company.
The Hartford Courant reported that the young specialist had a chronic back condition that could have kept her home during the deployment.
The daughter of a Vietnam veteran, Cindy would hear none of it. “Of course, I’m going, silly. I couldn’t let my best buddy go off alone,” she told a friend and fellow service member.
On February 28, 1991, just hours after President George H.W. Bush declared a cease-fire to end the Gulf War, Specialist Cindy Beaudoin was killed in action after her convoy struck a landmine. She was only 19.
Cindy Beaudoin did not die in vain. Neither did any other American who we honor on Memorial Day.
But we should always remember that the decisions leading to war are those of policymakers- not the veterans themselves. Sometimes the mission is clear-cut. In World War II, millions were liberated and truly evil regimes were toppled.
Memorial Day is the day to recall not just the memories of Cindy Beaudoin, but to honor the sacrifices made by the one million heroes who died while defending this country since the American Revolution.
And that sacrifice is painfully shared by the Gold Star families and close friends of these heroes. Most of us will not truly understand the depths of their despair unless we have experienced it.
But we can always offer our support. We can wear the poppy. We can place flags and wreaths at their graves. We can donate to charities that provide for their families. And we can look at their surviving brothers and sisters-in-arms and say, “Thank you for your service.”
Our organization – The American Legion – recognizes that when rounds are coming your way, there is no such thing as “a small war.”
More than 1,600 Americans have lost their lives fighting in covert operations and cold war battles that occurred between the designated war periods since the attack on Pearl Harbor.
We honor their sacrifice as much as we honor those lost on Iwo Jima or at the Frozen Chosin.
For one hundred years the Preamble of the Constitution of The American Legion stated our commitment to “preserve the memories and incidents of our associations in the Great War,” and later the “Great Wars.” This wording was a natural outcome for an organization that was founded by World War I veterans and succeeded by equally committed World War II veterans.
In 2019, we changed our Preamble and expanded our publicly stated commitment. We now promise to “preserve the memories and incidents of our associations in ALL wars.”
We are here today to honor ALL of our fallen heroes. Fallujah and the Philip-pines. Khe Sanh and Kandahar. Beirut and Grenada. We honor American heroes from the American Revolution through the Global War on Terrorism, and every battle in-between.
The location is unimportant. It is the hearts of these men and women that truly matters. It is the devotion within that led them to sacrifice their lives for the country that we all love.
God Bless you and God Bless America!
Peter J. Killian
Commander
American Legion
Manhasset Post 304
MANHASSET
GOLD STAR HONOR ROLL
CIVIL WAR
David Brooks
James Cehern
George (Washington) Coles
William Hewlett
W.H. Hoogland
Daniel Lewis Hopkins
Benjamin Seaman
John Shanshaw
George Van Nostrand
John Wagner
WORLD WAR I
John Fox
James T. Gray
Joseph L. Hutchings
Yarnack Maciewsky
Charles Morangello
Joseph Nowicki
John H. Rice
Thomas Shea
Morrell Smith
George R. Walker
Harold T. Woolley
WORLD WAR II
Willis Allen
August J. Bachor, Jr.
Harriet A. Beckman
James F. Burns
Frank Capel
Wells W. Carrol
Emmett Corrigan, Jr.
Peter J. Courand
Daniel J. Dair
Samuel Davidovitch
Benjamin Davis, Jr.
William Evans
Bruce Fahnestock
Kent Fay
H.B. Fraas
Robert W. Giebel
Fletcher L. Gill, Jr.
Robert Greenlee
William W. Gurney
Warren W. Harvey
Emile Henderson, Jr.
Richard Hodge
Clarance Huxley
Clifford A. Jackson
John Kushay, Jr.
Frederick G. Lake
Louis J. Lombardi
James J. O’Connell
Thomas J. O’Connor, Jr.
Andrew L. Pardie
Daniel O. Payson
John Pruskowski
H.H. Rimmer
Frank C. Rugato
J.M. Rybecky
John Seidenburg
James Shakespeare
James V. Shanley
Richard C. Sieck
William B. Simmons, Jr.
Henry Surowiec
Gunnar T. Swanson, Jr.
Victor T. Turrow
Joseph Vavrinec
James K. Vincent
George R. Waldmann II
Chester W. Witucki
KOREAN WAR
Edward Farrell
Judson P. Hurd
Robert T. Munday
William Scully
Thomas L. Van Riper
