Veterans home to hold Veterans Day ceremony Friday morning

Gil Pound, The Union-Recorder, Milledgeville, Ga.
·2 min read

Nov. 8—Every day is Veterans Day at the local Georgia War Veterans Home, but later this week just a little more emphasis will be placed on celebrating those who fought for our country's freedoms.

The skilled nursing care facility — home to some 150 Georgia veterans — is scheduled to hold its annual Veterans Day ceremony 11 a.m. Friday in front of the Carl Vinson Building. This is the second year in a row the program has been brought back after a forced couple of years off due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The ceremony is set to feature a drill team, color guard, singing of the national anthem, and a veterans' platoon march. The enticing smell on the south side Friday morning will be Georgia Power Co. employees grilling up a tasty lunch of hamburgers and hot dogs for those in attendance. A reception inside the Veterans Home's Birdsong Recreation Hall will follow the ceremony Friday.

This year's keynote speaker for the event is Georgia Department of Veterans Service Commissioner Patricia Ross. A veteran herself, Ross served 25 years on active duty in the United States Air Force. She retired as a colonel in October 2014, finishing her career as the vice commander of the 78th Air Base Wing at Robins Air Force Base where she led the management of facilities. After her military service, Ross was the chief operating officer at the Veterans Education Career Transition Resource Center, also known as the VECTR Center, in Warner Robins. The center provides veterans and their families a gateway into Georgia's public technical colleges and university system schools.

In November 2021, Georgia's seven-member State Veterans Service Board selected Ross to lead the Department of Veterans Service, the state agency charged with advising veterans on how to receive their military benefits. GDVS also owns and maintains the state's two skilled nursing care veterans homes in Milledgeville and Augusta.

The roots of Veterans Day can be traced back over 100 years ago to the end of World War I. In November 1919, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed Nov. 11 as the first Armistice Day. The date, primarily set aside to honor veterans of World War I, was made a legal holiday in 1938. In 1954 after World War II and fighting in Korea, veterans service organizations urged Congress to strike the word "Armistice" and replace it with "Veterans." So it was done, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower later that same year issued the nation's first Veterans Day proclamation.