Veterans receive welcome home

“We didn’t get this when we came back.”

Eighty-six veterans flew Allegiant Air on the Flight to Honor Polk Mission 9 from Lakeland to Washington, BWI Airport to spend the day with their guardians visiting monuments and revisiting moments and memories from their duty to country.

Vietnam minesweeper Allen Hooker, 80, was waiting on the tarmac with his wife. He had flown on the Flight To Honor three times and was twice a guardian.

“I feel like these guys need to be honored,” he said. “Lakeland is very appreciative, and they show it to the vets. They respect them and don’t take them for granted. As you know, we didn’t get any welcome back. This makes up for it.”

With a mixture of World War II and Vietnam veterans, tired men emerged from the plane to a flag-waving, sign-shaking, clapping crowd of more than 600 mostly dressed in patriotic red, white and blue.

The veterans rode past the Lakeland Symphony Band past well-wishers with envelopes of letters expressing gratitude and love from children and family members in their hands. They also received congressional proclamations and coins during the trip before accepting comforting red, white and blue quilts from veteran Lori Marker as representative of the Crossroad Stitchers of Lakeland as the veterans reached the airport lobby.

The second veteran who received a quilt was overcome by emotion and openly cried.

Six men from the Glades at Champions Gate took the flight at the encouragement of Ellie Moore whose husband, Carleton, enjoyed the flight in 2016. He passed in 2018 but left behind a keepsake book made by his guardian and his guardian’s wife.

“Carleton just loved it,” Moore said.

She remembered what the flight and book meant to him.

“Last year I was sitting around and thought, ‘I wonder if I can get vets to go,” she added. “I found three.”

This year for Mission 9 led by Air Force Col. Gary Clark, Moore found six veterans in her community,

She gathered Bernie Ezzell, 78. who served in Vietnam in “The Delta”, for four years with an Army security agency; Ed Hair, who served in Korea in 1951-’52 in the Army infantry as a rifleman, Dom Lore, who served in Germany in 1954-’56, Fred Holton, who served in the Air Force in 1962-’68 as an air traffic controller, Army service member Richard Cosky, who served in Vietnam and Gary Mendoza, 78, who was drafted and served in Vietnam in combat for two years with the Army.

“It was a wonderful day,” said Mendoza. “It was a long day. I’ll never forget it.”

Mendoza found the name of one of his Jefferson High School (Daly City, CA) classmates – Bobby Molossi, on the Vietnam Memorial.

“He got killed the same year I was there,” Mendoza said.   

Jeremy Gleason of Auburndale was Mendoza’s guardian.

When asked why he went on the flight, Gleason answered, “How could you not? I’ll try to do it more.”

“He was excellent,” said Mendoza. “He wouldn’t let me do anything.”

Mendoza said a crowd at the BWI airport, waited for the veterans to arrive and clapped for them.

“It was amazing,” Mendoza said.

Art Bedell of Four Lakes in Winter Haven also went.

“It was breath-taking,” he said. Bedell was a staff Sgt. in the Army from 1966-1970 as a cryptographic instructor with 13 months served in Korea.

“What can I say? I’d recommend this to anybody,” he said of the trip. “The experience is incredible. It’s so well put together.”

When they landed, the pilot told the veterans to look to their left out the window. “I couldn’t believe it,” he said of the crowd, fire trucks and band.

The Washington D.C. military monuments touched him.

“You can’t explain,” he said of the trip. “I have letters from so many, from my grandkids and my son. They did a great job.”

David Zabel of Winter Haven was also a guardian on the trip.

“They got the things they should have got the first time they came home,” said Zabel.