Danville Rotary Club: Teamwork and the Memorial Day Flag Tradition

The countdown is on to Memorial Day Weekend, and Danville Noon Rotary is once again getting ready to line Vermilion Street with American Flags from First Christian Church at Vermilion and English, all the way north to the Walmart.  Danville Rotary’s Rick Rotrammel and Keith Souza joined us over the weekend on  1490 WDAN’s News Makers program.  Rotrammel says, those flags, put in by volunteers, are usually placed about 15 to 18 feet apart.  But as you’re driving, they look a lot closer.

AUDIO: It’s just an amazing sight if you’ve never seen it.  When you’re driving up Vermilion on the weekend, whether you’re going north or south, when you’re driving along there at your 35 mile an hour speed limit (we hope); they look like they’re right next to each other.  And they’re really not that close.

Souza reminds us that the Vermilion County War Museum is heavily involved in this.  They receive a lot of the proceeds, and they help take care of the flags after they are pulled up the day after Memorial Day, determining which ones can be used next year.

AUDIO: Their staff down there works to print the tags, and names that are on them.  And when we do load them up in the backs of the trucks, and we carry them into the War Musuem, their volunteers take a wet rag and clean them off.  Because depending on the weekend, we’ve had it before where it’s been really dry leading up to memorial day; a little tougher to get them in.  (We) get them back to them; and what their stuff does is kind of evaluates whether the flag is damaged.

Rotrammel says, there are always plenty of  volunteers ready to go, starting at 8 AM the Friday before Memorial Day Weekend.

AUDIO: We have four teams of people with giant barrels of flags.  And each team has a different section of Vermilion, that they’ll do north and then cross and then come back south.  Luckily, the drivers on Vermilion; they know what’s going on, it appears.  They allow us to cross the street.  And while we’re putting the flags in, I’ll tell you, people are honking their horns and waving.

Remember, you can honor a deceased Veteran or a deceased loved one.  And the sponsorships can be by individuals or businesses.  Just go to RotaryFlag.com.