We invited the student essay winners to attend our December meeting and present their essays to a joint meeting of the Auxiliary and the Post. All any of us could say after they were done was “Wow”. Beginning with Amanda Harris, a 5th grader at Mukilteo Elementary who spoke of her father’s four tours in Afghanistan and the four times he has been wounded, Gunnar Brent our Patriot’s Pen winner, and finally Katarina Nguyen who won the Post’s Voice of Democracy for the third year in row. Katarina, whose parents were both born in Vietnam and fled after the Communist overran their country, interviewed a number of veterans from our Post. The veterans were from all the conflicts from WWII to the present wars in the far east. I have published her essay in whole on our website. Special thanks goes to Capt. Rock Roth for having, by far, the most successful essay contest in memory. We had a number of entries on all levels and Rock did a great job (along with Fred) grading them and selecting the winners. We wish them success at District One competition.
