News-Info-Alerts

Re: POW-MIA Quilt of Honor

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: August 23, 2003

"Vero Beach Veterans to receive POW-MIA Quilt of Honor

The Quilt of Honor will be displayed at the club after a presentation 3 p.m. Sunday at the Vero Beach Veterans building, 2500 15th Ave., Vero Beach.

By Elliott Jones staff writer

VERO BEACH — A local community group is presenting to the Vero Beach Veterans Inc. a large wall hanging commemorating 62 Vietnam War POW-MIAs from Florida.

The Universal Angel Foundation created the 7-foot by 10-foot wall hanging made of page-size squares, each of which has a name of one of the Florida veterans who are unaccounted for. None of the 62 are from the Treasure Coast.

A local quilt shop sewed together the felt-and-paper squares, creating a Quilt of Honor, said Vikki Wells, director of the Vero Beach-based Universal Angel Foundation.

Normally the foundation distributes small angels to people needing inspiration. "I felt we needed to reach out to others," Wells said. "We honor life and these men offered their lives" in war.

"We are honored to get the Quilt of Honor," said Jerry Maeglin, president of the Vero Beach Veterans, a club of about 500 members, more than half of whom are veterans. About 75 of the members, including Maeglin, served in Vietnam.

The Quilt of Honor will be displayed at his club.

The presentation will be 3 p.m. Sunday at the Vero Beach Veterans building, 2500 15th Ave., Vero Beach. Members of local veterans organization have been invited to attend the ceremony. The public is welcome, he said.

Maeglin hopes the Quilt of Honor will make the public aware that people still are missing in action from wars in which the United States has been involved. "Many people are still unaccounted for," leaving the families wondering, he said.

In the past, the Vero Beach Veterans helped distribute bracelets to bring attention to MIAs.

Along with the wall-hanging, Wells is giving the club a booklet of information, available on the Internet, about each of the 62 veterans. One is Frederick Crosby, a 32-year-old Orlando resident and Navy pilot who was shot down over North Vietnam June 1, 1965. His airplane crashed and exploded.

Eventually, Wells hopes to raise money to create a similar commemorative display for POWs and MIAs of all wars. To do that, she is selling engraved granite squares and yellow ribbons on wood.

For more information about the foundation's Quilt of Honor, call Maeglin 473-7709 or Wells at the Universal Angel Foundation, 299-3428.

Wells created the Universal Angel Foundation in 1999 after she learned she had cancer. So far, the foundation has sent about 3,700 angels throughout the United States and the world, Wells said.

- elliott.jones@scripps.com

©2002 - The E.W. Scripps Co."