The Ancil Geiger American Legion Post 226 honor guard led Milford’s Memorial Day Parade, Monday, May 28. (Photos by David Hazledine)

MILFORD — The town of Milford turned out in large numbers despite the 90 degree heat for the 150th anniversary of the first Memorial Day. Those who died while serving in the armed forces were honored first with a parade and then a ceremony at Milford Cemetery.

Band Middle School Band participates in the parade

The American Legion Ancil Geiger Post 226 honor guard led the parade, with Stan Stump reminding those gathered it was a “day of honoring the veterans not the legion.” Legion member Bob Geiger then led a prayer invoking the memory of fallen men and women who would continue to walk with the nation “into the future.” Three volleys were fired in their honor.

The following parade was a long, colorful pageant representing the community’s businesses, service organizations, emergency responders, schools and more, all walking or riding horses, cars, trucks, tractors, motorcycles and floats as they threw candy, bracelets and necklaces to waiting children along the parade route, most of which ran down Main Street.

American Legion Ancil Geiger Post 226 and the Milford School band took part in the ceremony at Milford Cemetery.

Memorial Day activities then moved to a far, shaded corner of Milford Cemetery, where veterans are traditionally honored. Geiger took notice of the “abundance of flags” in the cemetery during his prayer, representing the “men and women who have served this country well.”

Legion member Dennis Newcomer also spoke of the flags, 500 of which have been recently placed in Milford and surrounding cemeteries, representing veterans from the Civil War to the present.

The flags, said Newcomer, are proof “there are heroes in Milford.”

Chris Brown, left, read the names of vets who died in 2017, one of which was his grandfather, Robert Brown. Bob Geiger, center, read the prayer, and Dennis Newcomer also spoke.

Chris Brown, a former marine who served two tours of duty in Afghanistan, was on hand to read the names of those veterans in the community who died in the past year. One of those was Brown’s own grandfather, Robert Brown, who until this year read the names.

Brown referred to war as the “evil necessity” and said it was only “by the grace of God we are not having our names read today.”

The following veterans from the Milford community died in 2017: Robert Brown, Ted Brooks, Betty Taylor, Bruce McClintock, Bruce “Larry” Vanlaningham, Gordon Rhodes, Dick Felkner, Paul Becker, Loretta McAllister, Bill Stieglitz, Harley Stieglitz.

The Milford School band was also on hand to perform the national anthem. They were followed by a three-volley salute from the honor guard and the playing of the bugle call, “Taps.”