Cherokee Tribune Article

From the article

We have had our first article in the local papers published yesterday and are extremly happy. Below is the article:

Volunteers with national organization to lay wreaths at Sutallee cemetery

Published: 11/28/2007
Donna Harris

No one should be forgotten at Christmas, especially the men and women who sacrificed all they had to give Americans the greatest gift they could ever have: freedom.

Wreaths Across America is a nonprofit organization whose goal is to place Christmas wreaths on every grave in every state and national veterans cemetery in the country and in every American military cemetery on foreign soil.

The project, originally called the Arlington Wreath Project, began 16 years ago when the Worcester Wreath Co. in Harrington, Maine, began donating wreaths to decorate the headstones of the country's fallen heroes at Arlington National Cemetery.

Each year since then, the company has donated 5,000 wreaths - 75,000 total - for volunteers to place on the graves during a wreath-laying ceremony in December, and it will double its 2007 donation to 10,000 wreaths.

Last year, the campaign was re-dubbed Wreaths Across America, and the wreath company officials asked civic-minded groups like the Civil Air Patrol and the Patriot Guard Riders to help them spread the project to more than 230 national and state veterans cemeteries and monuments across the nation. The company will donate 1,800 wreaths representing all branches of the armed forces to those cemeteries.

This year, the veterans resting in the Georgia National Cemetery in Sutallee will be honored with remembrance wreaths during the nationwide ceremony at noon Saturday, Dec. 15.

Evanthe Papastathis of Atlanta, a second lieutenant with the Civil Air Patrol, has volunteered to lead the ceremony at the cemetery, where she will place specially made wreaths on memorials for the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, Merchant Marines and POW/MIAs.

"The whole mission behind the wreaths is to honor the military, remember our fallen military and teach children about the people who made these sacrifices and what that means," she said. "That's core values. If we forget these things, we forget where our freedom came from."

During the ceremony, Ms. Papastathis said she and a veteran from each of the seven military branches will place ceremonial wreaths for each branch in the assembly area of the cemetery.

"The gentleman representing the Air Force is a friend of the very first person resting there," she said.

The ceremony, which U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-east Cobb) and other government leaders are expected to attend, will end with a military fly-over, she said.

Ms. Papastathis said she knew about the wreath project but didn't take over the role of leading the ceremony at the Sutallee cemetery until September. "The gentleman who would normally do it couldn't do it so he sent out an e-mail asking if anyone could do it," she said. "I've got somebody I love up there (as well as a couple of friends) so I said I'd do it, not realizing how big a project it was going to be."

But volunteering for the role wasn't a difficult decision for her to make. "I go to the cemetery so I can meet a lot of people," she said, noting she is "just someone with no military background who's very grateful for those who do." "They talk about their families, and I listen to some stories and think, my God, they really gave up everything."

Through soliciting donations from "friends and friend of friends," she managed to raise enough money to buy 500 wreaths for the cemetery, which she called "a beautiful place to be resting."

"We need 1,350 so next year, I'll start earlier," she said, noting she'll have more time to garner corporate donations for wreaths. "My boss has a lot of influential friends who at the last minute came up with some money."

Wreath donations - $15 for a remembrance wreath or $18 for a personal remembrance wreath - also are accepted through the Wreaths Across America Web site from anyone who wants to honor a fallen hero, though it's too late to order one for this year.

"Ultimately we hope one day to get enough sponsors to place a wreath on every military resting place in the country and some in foreign countries," Ms. Papastathis said. "We've got a lot of outpouring of love for this particular project."