Guaranteeing freedom is "an awesome responsibility" because "true freedom in this world is rare," retired Chief Master Sgt. Richard Green, who served 38 years with the Air National Guard, said Monday at the community's annual Veterans Day Service.
Held under the pavilion at the Hot Springs Farmers & Artisans Market, across the street from its normal location at the Garland County Veterans Memorial and Military Park because of heavy rain, Monday's ceremony marked the holiday which initially celebrated the end of World War I but since 1954 has served to honor all veterans of military service.
Dick Holden, a Veterans Memorial committee member, noted Monday was the 101st celebration of Veterans Day, counting the years it was known as Armistice Day, and the 11th year it has been held in Garland County "at or near the memorial."
"This day we celebrate and honor all United States military veterans who have served or are currently serving to preserve the God-given freedom and liberty we enjoy in our great nation," Holden said. "Your presence here today, especially today, is evidence of your patriotism and your desire to remember and thank and honor all of our veterans."
A Little Rock native, Green, the keynote speaker, retired from the Air National Guard in 2004 and currently serves as the Arkansas Enlisted Association of the National Guard 2020 National Conference administrator. He was also a deputy with the Garland County Sheriff's Department, serving with the Marine Patrol Division, from 2012 through 2017, adding up to over 47 years of public service.
"I'm so proud to be a veteran myself and it's such an honor to be able to put this uniform on again," Green said, but stressed the importance of remaining humble. Recounting his "most humbling experience," Green recalled a night shortly after qualifying as a flight engineer on a C-130 when he was home studying and had some of his flight gear with him.
He said his daughter, who was 5 at the time, picked up his headset and put it on, walking around the room. "She was so proud of her daddy becoming a flight engineer. It really touched me and was so special. Until she walked up to me, put the cord in my face and said, 'Welcome to McDonald's, may I help you?' Like I said, it's good to be humble."
Green said Veterans Day is now observed on Nov. 11 "regardless of what day of the week it falls on and even if it rains," and noted the heavy rain Monday morning reminded him of the Korean War Memorial in Washington, D.C., which depicts the soldiers wearing ponchos because of "the miserable weather they served in."
He said Veterans Day honors the American veterans' "willingness to serve" and "their sacrifice for the common good," noting, "My favorite veteran, who I never met, was my grandfather. He was a combat medic who was killed in World War I on Oct. 1, 1918, 41 days before the war ended.
"More tragic than that, my mother never knew her father because she wasn't born until three months later on Jan. 18, 1919. So this day always has a little extra special meaning to me."
Green said while veterans have given Americans the freedom and liberty they enjoy, "we so often take them for granted. Freedom and liberty are like the air all around us. We are generally unaware of even it's presence. We give our air little thought or consideration, we can't see it or taste it or smell it unless the pollution is too bad."
"We can feel it if it gets too hot or too cold but generally we take it for granted. To be deprived of that air for even a few moments turns us red in the face and then blue gasping for that precious substance we took for granted. So it is with liberty and freedom. Those that have it come too frequently to prize it not at all and to take it for granted," he said.
Green said his second favorite veteran was U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. James Robinson Risner, a man he was proud to call a friend and mentor and "one of the great patriots of our country."
Risner spent seven years and four months as a prisoner of war in Vietnam in the infamous prison camp dubbed the "Hanoi Hilton." Green said Risner "taught me what freedom is all about," noting Risner told him, "'To realize what freedom is you must lose it.'"
Green said it's important to appreciate "what our veterans are all about and what they have protected and are protecting now." He said, "We as Americans are so blessed to have freedom and liberty, but it's certainly not free."
He said Risner once said, "'To be born free is an accident, to live free is a privilege, to die free is an obligation.'"
"I want to thank all the veterans now and those who will serve in the future for fulfilling that obligation and giving us that freedom. The patriots and warriors we honor here today, especially those who gave the full measure, their lives,"Green said.
Local on 11/12/2019