Veteran’s Day is behind us. While this was a great day to celebrate those who make the ultimate sacrifice, Midwest City - due to being a military town - knows that such a commemoration is necessary all year long.
A local non-profit, Oklahoma Honor Flight, embodies that spirit perfectly as its entire purpose is to honor Oklahoma veterans who served in WWII by sponsoring a trip to Washington D.C. to see the memorials built to recognize their service.
Born out of the collaboration between state representative Gary Banz and Sherry Sprager, upon Sprager’s father, Al Willoughby, having to go through Dallas Honor Flights for the trip to the nation’s capital. They spotlight WWII veterans from all around Oklahoma to prevent that from occurring again.
Veterans like Midwest City’s own Raymond Harding.
Harding, 89, has seen it all. Harding served in the Army Air Corps where he flew 41 missions on the aircraft and Night Missions, as a flight engineer. He survived the aircrafts 29 hits over that time frame. He made it through a mission where they were told to abandon the plane only narrowly saving it to land. He’s worked on all type of aircrafts during his 29 years at Tinker Air Force Base. Yet until October 8 of this year, he had never seen the memorial dedicated to his service during WWII. Oklahoma Honor Flights allowed him that opportunity and he’s thankful for what they do.
"A lot of these guys will never make another trip up there," said Harding, "Takes quite a bit to organize one of these things. Everyone cooperated real well."
He’s right. It’s no small feat pulling off these trips. The non-profit runs completely on unpaid volunteers out of the organizers homes. That aspect leaves the $1.5 million they’ve raised over the years where Banz says it belongs to our veterans.
"We still have an opportunity. We still have time to come together and say thanks to that generation. They won’t be here much longer," said Banz about the honor flights. "Our intent is that at every turn our veterans are the ones that our featured."
The organization has put on 15 flights since its inception in 2009. Each flight costs around $100,000.00. They have two goals for the flight, recognize our WWII veterans and link our youth in the process. The night before each flight is a parade of patriots. It’s a pre-flight dinner open to the public where each veteran has a youth companion for the night. The dinner culminates with a handshake between the two with a unique trade-off. The veteran gets an honor flight commemorative coin while the youth receives a pocket sized copy of the U.S. Constitution.
The youth of Midwest City have roots within the organization since its birth. Mid-Del schools raised over $25,000 for the first flight in 2010. They also write letters to the veterans which are read at the end of the journey to pay homage to the letters from home, just like mail call.
It’s a herculean effort to pull off the event from the sendoff event highlighted by fire trucks streaming water blasts over the airplane to providing care in case an emergency arises with a veteran on the trip. Banz and crew know it’s a group effort.
"It’s not me. It’s all of Oklahoma. It’s all of Midwest City. It’s all of Del City. It’s all of Choctaw. It’s all of Spencer," said Banz about being able to pull off the flights.
It’s about the community with Oklahoma Honor Flights. It’s about linking veterans old and new. It’s about linking those veterans with our youth. It’s about knowing our country’s history and celebrating our military’s sacrifice. That’s what Veterans Day is about. Truthfully, that’s what every day should be about.
