Veteran's Day article.

This was one of the worst days of my life. But before that:

A 21-gun salute erupted in the field outside Reeder Hall this past Veterans Day as Edinboro held its annual Veterans Day reception on Nov. 11, beginning at 3 p.m. The events were presided over by Kahan Sablo, the interim vice president of student affairs.

President Jeremy Brown was unable to attend, due to an engagement in Harrisburg.

Sablo referenced his own experience at a leaders' training camp in Fort Knox over the summer, where he lived like an "army cadet" for a week.

"But I was only there for five days. Afterward I returned to a safe and warm home," Sablo said. "It was a lesson in life that taught me never to take for granted the members of our armed forces."

Veterans of all the nation's wars, even going back to the Revolutionary War, and then up until the current conflicts ongoing in Iraq and Afghanistan, of which many present had seen action in, were recognized.

The event also showcased the talents of the campus' ROTC students from the military sciences department. Many will go into the service upon their graduation from Edinboro.

Also acknowledged were those lost in the recent shooting at the military base Fort Hood, right as the annual moment of silence occurred.

Part of the presentation took place indoors and involved a speech by Sablo, as well as an earlier-recorded speech by Brown. Brown, a native of Manchester, England, put an interesting, international perspective on the holiday. In England, as well as other commonwealth nations, it is known as "Rememberance Day."

"This time, every year, we would go to school and buy poppies, purportedly made by veterans of the first world war," Brown remembered. "We were showing our support and thanks for our gratitude for those who had fallen in the first world war and other wars."

The poppies became a symbol of wartime memorials following the events of Flanders Field, a campaign in 1917. Poppies grow profusely in Flanders.

For the flag-folding ceremony, in lieu of Brown, Edinboro University Council of Trustees member Ray Dombrowski was presented the flag. Dombrowski is a veteran of the World War II. He is the secretary of the board.

According to an article by the Erie Times News, more than 100 Edinboro University?students and current staff and faculty members have served in the armed forces.

Brown summoned words by writer Rudyard Kipling, which were extremely meaningful this day: "O thirty million English that babble of England's might,

Behold there are twenty heroes who lack their food to-night;

Our children's children are lisping to honour the charge they made -

And we leave to the streets and the workhouse the charge of the Light Brigade!"

Veterans Day was originally known as Armistice Day and was incorporated to celebrate the end of World War I, which ended in an armistice accord on Nov. 11, 1918, between the Allied Nations and Germany, "on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month." After World War II and the Korean War however, Armistice Day became Veteran's Day to honor "American veterans of all wars."

NOVEMBER 19, 2009