Calypso Wreaths Across America pays tribute to deceased veterans

CALYPSO — It took only minutes for an energetic 5-year-old Tuck Kilpatrick to place the two fresh evergreen wreaths he had lugged across Calypso’s Maplewood Cemetery Saturday.

“Mommy, can I go get me another wreat?” he implored.

Mom Melissa Kilpatrick handed Tuck the wreath she was holding, and he promptly set off looking for another veteran’s grave on which to place it.

The Kilpatricks were among the approximately 100 people braving chilly temperatures to attend the Saturday morning, Dec. 17, Wreaths Across America ceremony that placed live evergreen wreaths on the graves of veterans.

The Kilpatricks have no family members buried in the cemetery. Tuck was at the event with his Calypso Cub Scout 42 that helped with the ceremony.

“This is his first year,” his mother said. “It is a wonderful program. It is great to acknowledge the veterans.

“We are glad to be a part of the Scouts and be able to teach them from a young age how important it is to honor your veterans. I am not sure he totally understands all of it.”

It was the second year that the town has hosted a Wreaths Across America ceremony.

The Calypso Wreaths Across America Committee exceeded its goal and was able to place more than 100 wreaths, organizer Debbie Langley Jones gratefully pointed out.

The Calypso ceremony was among 3,400 locations participating in the annual observance whose mission is to Remember, Honor and Teach, she said.

Jones, who has helped organize the ceremony for the past two years, became interested in the program three years ago after attending a Wreaths Across America ceremony in Faison.

Her late father, Cecil Langley, served in the U.S. Army.

“I like patriotic stuff,” she said. “It was so touching and moving to me that I needed to do this for my daddy and all of the veterans buried at Calypso. So I got up with Mike and Kay Singleton, they headed it up in Faison, and told them I wanted to do it for Calypso.

“They were most helpful to me last year on my first year. Everybody I asked graciously volunteered and agreed to help. Fortunately, I have been able to find veterans to handle most of what is needed out here (at the cemetery), which is great.”

Through the program, people can purchase a wreath for $15 to place on the grave of a veteran.

Jones said she was pleased with the turnout and ceremony.

Names were added to the list this year, she said.

Committee member Bill Rose and his wife Janet walked over the cemetery to ensure all of the veterans’ graves were identified, Jones said. Rose is a veteran of the N.C. National Guard.

“Four (wreaths) were taken away to other cemeteries, which was fine,” Jones noted. “So we had close to 100 out here.”

Jones said she was hopeful the ceremony will continue to be held in Calypso.

It was the second time that cousins Patty Blackburn and Gayle Crowe have participated in the ceremony.

“Gayle put the wreath on our uncle’s, John Ed Roberts’, grave because his kids are not here,” Blackburn said. “His only son is in Salisbury so he is not here.

“This one is my dad’s, Carlyle Roberts. My daddy was in the Army while I was just a child.”

Her father served in World War II, and one of her favorite stories that he used to tell involved a chance meeting with his brother while stationed in Hawaii.

“Daddy was in Hawaii waiting to be sent over,” Blackburn said. “He said it was the rainy season and the whole thing was red clay, and he looked up and here come Uncle John Ed in his Navy whites through that red clay.

“He said he had never seen anything more pretty in his life.”

“Can you imagine that reunion?” Crowe said.

It was important to be at the ceremony because of memories like that, the cousins attested.

“And because they did so much for us,” Blackburn chimed in.

Since last year’s ceremony, Blackburn said that her brother, Donald Roberts, who served in the Air Force, had passed away and is buried in Maplewood.

“This year across the country more than 3,400 participating locations like this one there are millions of Americans gathering safely in the nation to Remember, Honor and Teach,” said U.S. Air Force veteran and committee member Ryan Cox. “We are all proud to be Americans who live in a free society made up of people from many walks of life. The freedoms we enjoy today have not come without a price.

“Lying here before us, and in cemeteries across the nation, are men and women who gave their lives so that we can live in freedom without fear. We can worship as we see fit. We can raise our children to believe as we do. We are free to vote for the leaders of our choosing and we have the right to succeed and we have the right to fail in whatever endeavor we wish to pursue.”

The U.S. was founded on the principles of freedom, justice and equality, and the nation stands as a shining beacon for liberty and freedom to the world, Cox stressed.

“We thank those who gave their lives to keep us free, and we shall not forget you,” he said. “Today, more than ever, we reflect on our nation’s veterans and active-duty service members who have had and continue to fight to protect the innocent and the oppressed.”

The nation has always been the first to stand up for freedom for people from around the world, Cox said.

Cox pointed out that many attending the event have answered that call and have served their country well.

“For this we say thank you, and we are honored to know you,” he said. “There are many men and women serving today in all branches of the military here at home and at places far away that most of us have never heard of.”

Those men and women are part of the best-trained, best-equipped forces in the world, Cox said.

“We honor them and their families for the sacrifices they make each day to keep our country safe from terrorism, hatred and injustice,” he added.

Quoting the late President Ronald Reagan, Cox said that “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it on to our children in their blood stream. It must be fought for, protected and handed on for them to do the same or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it once was like in the United States where men were free.”

Wreaths Across America traces its roots back to Morrill Worchester, owner of Worcester Wreath Co. of Harrington, Maine, state Rep. Jimmy Dixon said during remarks to those gathered.

Worchester was a 12-year-old paperboy for the Bangor Daily News when he won a trip to Washington, D.C., to Arlington National Cemetery, Dixon explained.

It was an experience that followed Worchester throughout his life and successful career, reminding him that his good fortune was due in large part to the values of the U.S. and the veterans who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.

In 1992, the Worchester Wreath Co. that he owned found itself with a surplus of wreaths that they had no real use for, Dixon said. Arrangements were made for those wreaths to be placed at Arlington in one of the older sections of the cemetery.

That section had been receiving fewer and fewer visitors each year, Dixon stressed.

Unable to send thousands of wreaths to each state, Worchester soon began sending seven wreaths to every state — one for each branch of the military and one for the POWs and missing in action, he said.

In 2006, with help from the Civil Air Patrol and other civic group, simultaneous wreath layings were at about 150 locations around the country, he said.

In 2007, the Worcester family, along with veterans, and other groups and individuals who had helped with the annual veterans wreath ceremony in Arlington, formed Wreaths Across America, a non-profit organization, to continue and expand this effort, and support other groups around the country who wanted to do the same.

On Dec. 13, 2008, Congress unanimously designated that Dec. 13 was the official date for Wreaths Across America, Dixon said.

In 2014, Wreaths Across America and its network of volunteers laid over 700,000 memorial wreaths at 1,000 locations.

“Wreaths Across America is now a national event at locations across the United States of America and several at sea,” Dixon said.

Dixon also read the names of the veterans buried in the cemetery.

“Ladies and gentlemen, may the Lord bless us that if any of us or future generations have to give their life for the freedom of this country that we do it and do it as valiantly as those who have gone on before us,” he said. “God bless America that we can preserve freedom and liberty for future generations.”

The event included the ceremonial laying of eight wreaths commemorating the different branches of the U.S. military including a new one this year honoring those serving in the U.S. Space Force.

Taps was played by Harleigh Faulk of the North Duplin High School Band.

Members of Calypso Boy Scouts Troop 42 posted the colors and Calypso Cub Scouts Pack 42 led the Pledge of Allegiance.

Calypso Mayor David Tyndall gave the welcome. The Rev. Nick Nielson, pastor at Calypso Presbyterian, gave the invocation.

For more information about Wreaths Across America, visit www.wreathsacrossamerica.org.