Veterans of many wars mark their day with annual parade

BANGOR – Many of the thousands who lined up Friday morning along the streets of Bangor and Brewer to watch the Veterans Day parade have been touched by war.

Some had gone to battle themselves. Others had fathers or grandparents who served in World War II, the Korean War or the Vietnam War, while others had children or siblings who served in Desert Storm or who now are fighting in Iraq.

Michael Celli of Brewer, however, wore several hats. As a Brewer city councilor, he was among the state and local dignitaries invited to take in the parade from the reviewing stand near the corner of Main and Broad streets.

As a Civil War re-enactor, he wore a replica of a military uniform used more than 150 years ago.

As a dad, he was thinking about his 20-year-old son, Ryan, who serves with B Company, 3rd Battalion of the 172nd Mountain Infantry based in Brewer. Spc. Ryan Celli left in April for Mississippi for special training and now is serving in Iraq.

“He’s over there now,” Celli said. “I sent him a Veterans Day e-mail today. The day means a lot more to you when you have someone in Iraq.

“I think about him every minute of every day,” Celli said, as he climbed onto the reviewing stand to take his place with a group of elected officials that included city councilors from Bangor and Brewer. They later were joined by Gov. John Baldacci and U.S. Rep. Michael Michaud.

The day also held special meaning for Rachel Putnam, a Houlton native now residing in Old Town who came to downtown Bangor to watch the parade with her son Aaron, an Old Town High School track and cross-country runner.

Retired after a 20-year stint in the U.S. Navy that took her as far away as Sicily, Putnam said she was thinking about the friends she had made while serving as an aviation electronics technician.

At 45, she now has switched career gears and is less than a year away from a bachelor’s degree in landscape horticulture with a concentration in horticultural therapy.

Putman gets to apply what she is learning at the Maine Veterans Home in Bangor, where she is involved in a work study program through the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Before the parade, she helped veterans who live at the home climb into the passenger van they rode in the parade. Afterward, she came downtown “to watch everyone [and] cheer them on,” Putnam said.

Though not a combat veteran herself, she admires those who are because “they served so we can have parades like this,” she said.

Along the parade route, children and their parents waved American flags, some tiny, some large. People marched in place to music performed by several marching bands, as well as a Shriners band riding a flatbed.

But the crowds clapped and cheered loudest as veterans marched by or rode a variety of conveyances from antique cars to convertibles to buses to motorcycles.

Members of the local chapter of Veterans for Peace received a smattering of applause. Members of the group carried signs reading “Healthcare not warfare” and “Support our troops – Bring them home” among other things.

To some, the message proved controversial.

“My wife and I turned our backs on them,” said Thomas Kelly of Blue Hill, a Brewer native.

A retired U.S. Navy captain and Maine Maritime Academy graduate, Kelly recently returned from Iraq, where he worked for a subcontractor providing support services for coalition forces in Iraq. He was called upon to help improve security at the subcontractor’s facilities after the deadly attack on a base dining hall in Mosul last December.

“I’ve had these young guys from Blue Hill come up to me and ask what’s going on [with regard to support for U.S. troops],” he said. “These kids don’t need to hear all that. It’s discouraging for them.”