Grateful Girl Scouts representing a Grateful Nation:  A Thank-You to New Castle’s Veterans

November 11, 2011
by Lori Townsend, Chappaqua Girl Scouts

Students sleeping late… parents planning for another day off, or perhaps getting ready for a long-weekend getaway…. does that sound like your rhythm for Veterans Day?  If yes, enjoy!  But please also take a moment to remember the reason for this national holiday.

Originally, November 11, 1918 celebrated the end of World War I.  Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the first Armistice Day in 1919, but in 1954 it was renamed Veterans Day.  It is a day to honor both fallen and living military servicemen and servicewomen.  Five years ago, it was the idea of Carol Maher and Chappaqua Girl Scout Troop 1021 to thank Chappaqua’s servicemen and women when her current Greeley seniors were in eighth grade and working on their Silver Award.  The troop started with 23 veterans that first year but have delivered to 300 for the last several years, enlisting the help of other Girl Scout Troops.

If you see cars out and about today with American flags flying from their windows today, it is likely one of those troops on the way to deliver a small thank-you to a New Castle veteran.  The bags delivered include a small treat and a thank-you note.  Carol Maher thinks that “the impact we, all the scouts, have by just this simple thank you is really touching.”  The wife of one of the recipients last year commented that “no one had ever thanked her husband before” and that she thought it was the “best thing that Chappaqua Girl Scouts could ever do.”

Girl Scouts agree.  According to Carol, it is Troop 1021’s favorite thing to do in Scouting during the year.  Every year, as November 11th gets closer, Carol is approached quite often to make sure that Girl Scouts are still going to make their deliveries.  If you know of a New Castle Veteran who would like to be on our list – or if for any reason a Veteran would like to be removed from the list - please contact Carol at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). 

Some of the thank-you bags will include the poem below by Ralph Waldo Emerson.  We like to think that Emerson meant “men and women”—but otherwise it is a fitting tribute. 

Thank you, Veterans!

A Nation’s Strength

What makes a nation’s pillars high
And its foundation strong?
What makes it mighty to defy
The foes that round it throng?

It is not gold. Its kingdoms grand
Go down in battle shock;
Its shafts are laid on sinking sand,
Not on abiding rock.

Is it the sword? Ask the red dust
Of empires passed away;
The blood has turned their stones to rust,
Their glory to decay.

And is it pride? Ah, that bright crown
Has seemed to nations sweet;
But God has struck its luster down
In ashes at his feet.

Not gold but only men can make
A people great and strong;
Men who for truth and honor’s sake
Stand fast and suffer long.

Brave men who work while others sleep,
Who dare while others fly…
They build a nation’s pillars deep
And lift them to the sky.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson