Local U.S. Army veteran Gregg DeBoer and his son, center and left, with Col. Robert Nay, command chaplain of the Army Security Assistance Command at Redstone Arsenal. DeBoer said that after speaking with Nay at Saturday's celebration, he made a connection. "He knows my chaplain (Lt. Col. Ken LeBon) I had when I went to Iraq in 2003 really well." / Courtesy of Gregg DeBoer
VINEMONT – The long-awaited Cullman County Veterans Day Celebration took place Saturday at Cullman Regional Airport. A rain-soaked morning gave way to sunshine in the afternoon, and the crowds enjoyed both indoor and outside attractions. The event was put on by the Cullman Elks Club and organized by U.S. Air Force Col. Ken Brown (ret.).
The day was packed to the brim with events, guests, vendors, cars, military equipment and helicopters. This year’s event was dubbed “Good Morning Vietnam,” focusing on the Vietnam era, and opened with a ceremony including the Sons of the American Revolution Color Guard, soldiers from Cullman’s Company C, 1st Battalion, 167th (“4th Alabama”) Infantry, Cullman-area JROTC cadets and the Sons of Liberty Riders motorcycle club. After the invocation from U.S. Army Chaplain Robert Nay, the national anthem and opening remarks from Cullman Mayor Woody Jacobs, the program officially opened to the public.
One of the biggest hits of the day were the Bell UH-1 Huey helicopter rides.
“I was able to fly in the Huey with my two boys Max and Oliver and all three of us had a blast,” said Gregg DeBoer, a local U.S. Army veteran who served in Kosovo in 1999 and Iraq in 2003.
Other popular attractions were the Bell AH-1 “Cobra” helicopter gunship, the CH-47 “Chinook” cargo helicopter, an OH-6 “Cayuse” / “Loach” observation helicopter, an O-2 “Skymaster” forward air control aircraft that flew in Vietnam, the L-19 “Bird Dog” forward observation plane and a C-130 “Hercules” cargo plane.
Asked what his favorite part of the day was, DeBoer answered, “Being able to climb on the CH-47 with my boys and talk about how ‘Daddy has jumped right off the tailgate of these both with a parachute and without when I was in the Army.’”
Guests also enjoyed the mock Pleiku Field Hospital, a Vietnam-style fortified bunker, U.S. and enemy weapons/uniforms, a military vehicle display, Vietnam chaplain field worship site and a vintage Ford car show.
The day’s, and the whole weekend’s, special guest was the United States’ newest Congressional Medal of Honor recipient, U.S. Army Capt. Gary Michael “Mike” Rose. Rose was a Green Beret medic serving with the 5th Special Forces Group serving in long-undocumented operations in Laos as a member of the top-secret Military Assistance Command Vietnam Studies and Observations Group (MACVSOG, often referred to as MAC-SOG). On a four-day mission, Rose’s unit found itself already under fire before its helicopters even landed. Repeatedly placing himself in the line of fire and even boarding a crashed and burning troop transport helicopter to tend the wounded, Rose brought home all but three men of a 136-man force, though almost half were wounded, some multiple times.
Cullman Mayor Woody Jacobs and the Cullman Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) Post 2214 held a special Heroes Dinner Friday evening, featuring Rose.
Of his favorite part of the whole weekend, DeBoer shared, “We got to attend the Heroes Dinner, and getting to meet Capt. Rose, the most recent Medal of Honor awardee, was a sure-fire highlight.”
Rose spoke at the celebration on Saturday, along with other guests, including Vietnam F-105 fighter pilot John Caspar, Vietnam-era Huey pilots and U.S. Marine veteran Bill Korwatch.
To cap the day’s celebration, guests were treated to a parachuting demonstration by Skydive Alabama and a series of equipment and vehicle demonstrations, including ultra-lite aircraft, U.S. Air Force C-130 touch and go landings, an O-2 Forward Air Control aircraft demonstration and a Soviet YAK aircraft demonstration.
Veterans Day will be officially observed in the U.S. on Saturday, Nov. 11.
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