By Tanner Kent
Free Press Staff Writer
MANKATO —
For many veterans in attendance, Saturday’s small but heartfelt parade was a first:
A public welcome home.
Bill Simonette, commander of the Le Center VFW Post 1803, walked the route with a pair of fellow post members. All three nodded approval when asked if this was their first welcome home parade.
When event co-organizer Dobie Painter returned from Vietnam, he said he was met with spit and insults at an airport in San Francisco.
Brad Hardt, who served from 1972 to 1975 on a Navy aircraft carrier, said he returned without fanfare to his former life in Fairmont.
And when Randy Pautz concluded his Marine Corps service in 1972, he said there was “no such thing as this hero mentality we have today. We were basically looked down upon.”
Now, fast forward some four decades later.
Co-organizer Tim Adams, who became involved in Morson Ario VFW Post 9713 in Mankato after serving 20 years in the Navy, said it’s difficult to get to his terminal on time when he’s in uniform at the airport. So many people, he said, stop to say thank you.
“These guys didn’t get a pat on the back when they got home,” Adams said. “So, this is a small down payment on what we owe them.”
The parade route started at Franklin Elementary School and proceeded along Broad Street to Tourtelotte Park. A slightly soggy, but determined, crowd cheered and clapped as dozens of mostly Vietnam veterans marched past.
Several VFW and American Legion posts as well as color guards and auxiliary posts from around the region were in attendance. Also in the parade were members of the “Frozen Chosen,” Chapter 41 of the Korean War Veterans Association in Mankato.
Among them was Bill Hoehn, chapter commander, who was drafted and helped build airfields in Korea from 1953 to 1954. He arrived in the country 12 days before the war ended and his best friend was killed two days later.
When he came home, Hoehn said he tried to return as quickly as possible to civilian life. So, he put a down payment on a car and got married.
“We didn’t get any more of a welcome home than the Vietnam guys did,” Hoehn said.
Though publicizing the first-time event to veterans in the region was somewhat difficult — “Most of these guys don’t have Facebook,” Adams said — the goal is to make the parade an annual event.
Adams said he’d like to expand it to include veterans of all wars and coordinate future events with the return of soldiers who are currently overseas.
“Next year, we’ll have even more,” he said.
