National Veterans Flagpole United Interview here
National Veterans Flagpoles United is honoring 22 veterans by giving them each a flagpole to remember the 22 veterans we lose every day due to suicide. On Sunday, November 5, they will meet up at Jackson’s of Enid at 10 am, and at 11 am, they split into three teams to plant the flagpoles within the day.
Richard Riggins and Cale Grauberger from National Veterans Flagpoles United recently had an interview with EnidLIVE!
Richard started off by talking about the plan for the big event. “We get nominations . . . and I contact the veterans to let them know we’re coming out, and this is what we are going to do. I have also contacted a group down in Edmond. We installed flagpoles for them down there. They’re going to come up and assist us, and we have a retired lieutenant colonel that both Cale and I have served with.”
Richard also talked about the preparation it takes to do such an event. “We’re hoping to have enough volunteers to where we can break up into 3 groups. Cale will have one group, I’ll have a group, and our vice president, Roy, will have another group.” He went on to say, “We will brief everybody on how the ceremony will work and how the presentation will work, and then we’ll break down into 3 groups. Each group will have a certain amount of flagpoles that they will install during the day, and we’re hoping to meet up at 4 o’clock at our last veteran; who happens to be 96 years old, who is a World War II-era veteran.”
Cale spoke about how a typical flagpole installation goes. “As we get to a veteran’s house, the first thing that we do is we meet and greet the veteran, and tell them ‘thank you for their service’ and all that, and then we break into groups. We all kind of know what each other does, so we break off into a group mixing cement, there’s a group putting the pole up; and while all that’s going on, I’m on Facebook Live with the veteran, talking to them about their military service. I let them talk as much as they want, as little as they want, it’s totally up to them . . . Once we are done with that, we say the pledge of allegiance, I say a short prayer, then we take pictures with the flag up, and once that is done, we bring the flag down, because we like the flagpole to sit overnight in concrete . . . We bring the flag down and fold it, and as these gentlemen are folding it, I explain what each of the 13 folds represents. When they are done folding it, they give me the flag, and I stand at the position of attention with the flag, and we have a young lady from Garber, Elizabeth Moore, she comes out and plays Taps on the trumpet for us, once she is done, I go up and present the veteran with the folded flag.”