A8
NEWS
Blue Mountain Eagle
Wednesday, May 27, 2020
American Legion Auxiliary awards Humbolt students for winning Americanism essays
By Steven Mitchell
Blue Mountain Eagle
Nearly 100 students grappled
with how to address the health and
well-being of veterans, the military and
their families in the American Legion
Auxiliary’s annual Americanism Essay
Contest.
Coordinator Sherry Feiger said
Ellis Tracy Unit 77 has participated
for many years, but the pandemic has
made it difficult to recognize this year’s
essayists.
National leaders from the Auxil-
iary choose the question each year, and
winners are selected on a local level,
then state, regional and national.
Feiger said the students typically
winning first, second or third place
in their divisions read their essays at
a potluck dinner at the Alec Gay Hall
in John Day, but the dinner, due to
COVID-19, was canceled.
“It was also planned to honor two
young women who attended 2019
Girl’s State last June, Kaytlyn Wells
and Samantha Floyd,” Feiger said.
Humbolt Elementary School
teacher Amy Martin’s students took the
top three spots in the third- and fourth-
grade division. Carter Watterson’s
essay won the first prize while Alana
Spence and Gage Rosta won second
and third prizes, respectively.
For the fifth- and sixth-graders,
Jessica Surchorski’s students won the
first, second and third places. Maleah
Archibald’s essay took the top spot,
followed by Hannah Cole and Eliza
Bailey.
Feiger said the first-place essays
went to the state competition, but she
has not heard if they placed at that
level.
Watterson wrote that veterans fight
for freedom and keep the country safe.
“They’re American heroes, “ Wat-
terson said. “I want them to have the
best care that they can.”
Maleah Archibald said address-
ing the health and well-being of veter-
ans and their families is an issue that is
important to her.
“Veterans fought for our freedom,”
Archibald said.
‘VETERANS’
‘ADDRESSING OUR VETERANS’
BY CARTER WATTERSON,
FOURTH GRADE
BY MALEAH ARCHIBALD, FIFTH GRADE
I think veterans are the most important people
in our lives besides your family. I think that
because they are
the ones who fight
for freedom and
keep the United
States of Amer-
ica safe. I think
that if we want to
have freedom we
should help the
veterans by giving
them support and
getting really good
doctors to help
them. We could
give the veterans
Contributed photo
and their families Carter
Watterson,
a
care and help if
fourth-grader at Humbolt Ele-
they need it by
mentary School, took first place
starting fundraisers in the third- and fourth-grade
and raising money division of the American Legion
to give them all
Auxiliary’s annual Americanism
sorts of stuff. Like Essay Contest. This year’s topic
we could make
was on addressing the health
them tiny houses and well-being of veterans,
for the poor fami- their families and those who are
lies or if they lost actively serving.
their homes.
One way we can help veterans is we can
start a fundraiser to help raise money to
give to the homeless veterans or the vet-
erans that are poor. We could start off by
selling cookies or a lemonade stand or
anything else that can help us raise money
for them.
One other way we can help the homeless
veterans is we can build tiny houses or raise
money for them to buy a house. I feel like we
need to do some good to them because they
give us care because they fight for our coun-
try and keep us safe. So we definitely owe
them something.
So we thank them very much for all the good
they do for us and the country to keep us
safe.
OREGON CAPITAL
INSIDER
We need to address the health and
well-being of veterans in the mili-
tary and their families. We can help
them overcome their
stress and disabilities.
When they come back
from the military,
they and their fami-
lies have trouble with
health issues, finding
health care, injuries,
finding work, home-
lessness and death.
We can help them!
We need to make sure
veterans get all of the
health care they need.
Some care that they
need is not available
for them. We need
to have all of the
health care they need
close to them and
accessible for them.
Wherever they live
they should be able to
get help. They should
get that because they
served for our coun-
try.
Another problem is that some
veterans come back and they are
homeless. One-third of homeless
Americans are veter-
ans. When they come
home we need to
make sure they have a
home. We could make
up an apartment for
veterans (if they don’t
have a home) that
they can stay in when
they get back from the
military.
Contributed photo
Maleah Archibald, a fifth-grad-
er at Humbolt Elementary
School, took first place in the
fifth- and sixth-grade division
of the American Legion Aux-
iliary’s annual Americanism
Essay contest. This year’s topic
was on addressing the health
and well-being of veterans,
their families and those who
are actively serving.
PTSD is one of the health issues
veterans have. It is a disorder where
a person has a hard time recovering
after being in awful events. Between
11 and 20% of veterans have PTSD.
We should make sure they are able
to get therapies, medications and
go to specialists.
Veterans also come back from war
and can’t find jobs. They need to
support their families. We should
make up an organization that is run
by veterans so they can easily get
jobs once they come back from the
military.
When they are in the
military it is also hard.
They have to fight.
We could help them
by sending them care
packages. We could
also donate to the
USO. The USO helps
the military workers
and their families.
In World War II
420,000 U.S. soldiers
died. Many military
workers die today.
Their families are left
by themselves. Their families should
be able to get the help they need no
matter the cost. They should be able
to have food, homes and health
care too.
Veterans are important. They
served for our country. We need
to make sure that they and their
families get what they need to live.
We need to them with their health
issues, finding health care, injuries,
finding work, homelessness and
death. As you can see, we need to
address the health and well-being
of our veterans, military and their
families.
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