>
Flags will fly and bagpipes will wail as veterans are remembered Monday.
Memorial Day will be celebrated in veterans’ centers, parks and cemeteries throughout the North Olympic Peninsula.
Hundreds of American flags will fly at local cemeteries, including Ocean View Cemetery, 3127 West 18th St., and Mount Angeles Memorial Park, at the corner of Monroe Road and U.S. Highway 101, in Port Angeles.
A 9 a.m. ceremony Monday at Mount Angeles Memorial Park and an 11 a.m. ceremony at Sequim View Cemetery, at the corner of Sequim-Dungeness Way and Medsker Road will honor the memories of veterans. Both ceremonies are sponsored by local chapters of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.
A community memorial service at Gardiner Cemetery, on Gardiner Cemetery Road near the intersection with U.S. Highway 101 will start at 12:30 p.m., Gardiner Community Church Pastor John Morgan said.
A community gathering at the Chimacum Cemetery, on Beaver Valley Road near Center Valley Road will start at 2:30 p.m., said Margaret Corbett, quartermaster of VFW Post 4760 which will provide color guards.
Patriotic songs sung by community members will by a part of ceremonies starting at 11 a.m. at Pioneer Cemetery on Crescent Beach Road in Port Crescent.
Dungeness Cemetery on Lotzgessel Road in Sequim, a historical cemetery where many pioneers are buried, will be open throughout the weekend. Graves will be decorated with American flags and flowers, said General Manager Jay Davitt.
American Legion auxiliary members will put flowers on veterans’ graves in two ceremonies Monday.
Color guards from several veterans’ groups will join in the ceremonies which will start at 10 a.m. in Fort Worden Cemetery in Fort Worden State Park, north of Port Townsend, said newly elected auxiliary President Emily Anderson.
The second ceremony will start at 11 a.m. in Laurel Grove Cemetery, on Old Discovery Road near the intersection with 19th Street in Port Townsend, she said.
Auxiliary members will throw flowers into the water to remember those who died at sea in a noon ceremony on the pier near the intersection of Water and Madison streets on Port Townsend, Anderson said.
Wreaths will be laid on a monument to veterans in front of the Port Angeles Veterans’ Center, 216 S. Francis St., in a ceremony planned to start at 10:30 a.m. Monday.
Marine Corps League piper Don Alward will play “Amazing Grace” and “Taps” on the bagpipes and a rifle salute will be fired to honor deceased veterans.
The ceremony will end with plenty of time for the public to enjoy refreshments and still attend a ceremony at Veterans’ Park in Port Angeles, American Legion Commander Tim Splan said.
A statue honoring Medal of Honor winner Richard B. Anderson, an Agnew native, will be unveiled in noon ceremony in Veterans’ Park on Lincoln Street near Second Street.
In Port Williams, the Marlyn Wayne Nelson Memorial Park “Liberty Bell” will be rung four times at 10 a.m. Monday in a ceremony at the park on the beach at the east end of Port Williams Road east of Sequim.
The meaning and origin of Memorial Day will be considered in the ceremony. Several survivors of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor are planning to participate or attend the ceremony, said organizer C.W. (Wink) Mays.
Veterans of Foreign Wars of Forks is sponsoring a community ceremony at the Blue Star Memorial next to the flagpoles on Main Street south of the traffic light Monday at 11 a.m. The city orchestra will perform.
