Individuals born during World Wars I and II will remember the small red-and-white banners with the blue stars that hung in the front windows of our some of our homes and those of relatives, friends, neighbors and community members.

The Blue Star Banner displayed in the window meant a member of your family was serving in the armed forces.

The events of Tuesday, Sept. 11, that sent our military into action far from home have prompted the American Legion to lead an effort to put banners back in the windows of families with those serving in the military.

According to The American Legion Dispatch, a publication of the American Legion national headquarters, Legionnaires throughout the country are asked to “get behind the Blue Star Service Banner program during America’s war on terrorism.”

I thank Jim Umble of Carmel, commander of James W. Williams American Legion Post 12, for bringing this national project to our local attention.

In a letter to AL leaders, National Commander Richard Santos asked “the American Legion family to take the lead in a show of national pride and unity by providing a Blue Star Service Banner to every family in their area who has a relative serving in our war on terrorism,” he wrote.

“Let us provide this service to our military families. By hanging the banner in their windows, these families display their pride and patriotism.”

Military families in our readership area that want to obtain the banners may do so by calling Umble at 848-5342.

We applaud the Legion for reinstituting this simple but significant form of communication.

As the Dispatch reports, “the sight of Blue Star Banners in homes will remind us of the personal sacrifices being made to preserve our way of life.”

World Heritage, an international exchange program, is seeking host families in this area to provide a home for a high school student.

Formerly Spanish Heritage, World Heritage is a nonprofit, tax-exempt organization officially designated as an exchange visitor program by the U.S. Department of State and is listed by the Council of Standards on International Educational Travel.

World Heritage offers volunteer families, couples or single parents (with or without children at home) the opportunity to serve as host to a foreign student for a semester or a year.

Bob Quance represents World Heritage in this area and he would be happy to answer any questions you have about the program.

You may write him at P.O. Box 56, North Anson 04958, or call him at 566-0071 or (800) 758-9040.

Information is also available by visiting www.world-heritage.org.

Here is a question I can’t answer, but perhaps some of our readers can.

“How many marching bands, throughout the country, have a drum line of Bill, 70 years old; Bud, 69 years old; Leith, 65 years old and Jan, who is 70 years old?” asks “The Gov,” Leith Wadleigh of Veazie and founder of Governors All Maine Marching Band.

“Drums play every minute in a parade,” he wrote, “so who says that you are too old?”

I saw “The Gov” recently, and can attest to the fact that his new musical endeavors are extremely worthwhile, not just for those who get to see and hear this marching band, but for those who are members of the band.

I’ve known Leith for 30-plus years and can tell you he’s in the best shape I’ve ever seen him.

Three of the six statewide recipients of grants from the Equity Fund of the Maine Community Foundation are located in our readership area.

Established in 1996 with startup funding from the National Lesbian and Gay Community Funding Partnership, the Equity Fund helps build philanthropic support for nonprofit organizations serving Maine’s gay and lesbian communities.

The Mabel Wadsworth Women’s Health Center grant will enable that Bangor organization to support the community-building work of the Lesbian Health Project.

The grant to Coastal AIDS Network will support its Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender Questioning Youth Support Program in Knox, Lincoln and Waldo counties.

And the Bridges of Respect 2002 Conference will receive support from the Downeast Maine Chapter of the Gay Lesbian & Straight Education Network in Ellsworth, thanks to its Equity Fund grant.

Other grants went to the Maine Diversity Alliance and The Children’s Theatre of Maine, both in Portland, and Prevention Works Harm Reduction Services in Lewiston.

A recent visitor, Wendy Jones of Moncton, New Brunswick, hopes someone may have found her lost ring.

Coming to Bangor “for an overnight break” on Friday, Dec. 28, she wrote, the family left for home the next day, minus the ring that does not have “high monetary value … but has a great deal of sentimental value to me.”

The ring, Jones explained, belonged to her great-grandmother “and has been passed down to my grandmother, mother and then to me.”

Jones wrote she would be most appreciative if anyone who might have seen the ring “in or around” the Fairfield Inn, TJ Maxx, Dexter Shoe Store on Hogan Road, all in Bangor, or the Irving station on Route 9 in Brewer, would contact her.

Jones hopes “there is a good Samaritan, somewhere, who has found it already and just needs to know that there is an owner” who would like to have it back.

You can reach Jones at wendy j@health.nb.ca.

Joni Averill, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor 04402; 990-8288.