Armed Forces Day

ARMED FORCES DAY

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, on May 17, Armed Forces Day, I drove down to Madisonville, TN to participate in the raising of the largest American flag in our State. The people of Madisonville and Monroe County had been working on this for months.

The community joined together to make the Veterans Flag Memorial something to be proud of. Along with the impressive flag, a brick wall was erected.

Businesses donated bricks, mortar, concrete and a variety of services from architectural to brick masonry. Citizens donated approximately $70,000 to the project, including contributions and brick sales. The brick sales were reserved for veterans and active duty military. The memorial has been a labor of love for the community. The dedication ceremony to celebrate this hard work was an important event.

As I drove up to Haven Hill Memorial Gardens, where the ceremony was to be held, it started to rain; then it poured. Thunderstorms arrived, and lightning began to dance in the sky. Not many of us wanted to get too close to the 150 foot flagpole.

But through it all, the ceremony went forward. There must have been 500 people who sat there in the rain, absolutely drenched. And then, the sun came out as the program began.

The most impressive moment came with the raising of the flag. Twenty men marched forward carrying the flag. It was soaking wet and very heavy. This is what the organizer of the event, City Alderman Irad Lee, wrote to me:

I was told by the commander of the Tennessee State Guard that had we waited another five minutes, the flag would have been too heavy for their twenty men to carry. I am unsure how much a saturated 1,800 square foot flag weighs, yet one young man named Dwight Taylor of 312 Atkins Road in Madisonville, a city maintenance crew worker, auxiliary policeman and patriot, endured while cranking the flag to the top of flagpole.

I watched Dwight Taylor crank that flag to the top of the pole. I was astonished to see one man do that. It was a tribute to his patriotism and strength. It seemed at the time an impossible feat.

But so does the history of this country that our flag represents.

When Americans want to see the grandest flag in Tennessee, they will travel to Madisonville. And it is appropriate that they do so.

Congressman JIMMY DUNCAN told the crowd that Monroe County sent more volunteers to Desert Storm in the Gulf War for its population size than any other county in America. This is yet another example in our history of Tennessee living up to its nickname, "The Volunteer State."

I felt privileged to be a part of the Armed Forces Day event, and I wanted the nation to know about the patriotic citizens of Madisonville and Monroe County, TN.