Veterans Day at my Job

My employer believes in hiring Veterans and they are very accommodating to employees that get called to active duty and we at work do the "send care packages" to our troops in Afghanistan.
    Several years ago one of my friends started a "Veterans Day Celebration" and it has gotten bigger and bigger each year.  They ask us veterans to bring our shadowboxes and assorted souvenirs of our travels.

They had a cake cutting ceremony and the Oldest Veterans and the youngest veteran cut the cake, the symbolism from the oldest to the youngest and the bridge between all veterans.  The oldest guy is 58 and the youngest guy is 24.

The employer named one of their airplanes for the Veterans, the plane a Boeing 757 was repainted in October 4 years early and we have our own paint department and had the new graphics added for the ceremony.

And speaking of airplanes we had several Military planes make an appearance,
 

I figured Old NFO would be excited since this type of airplane is his war chariot.

Different View

The Plane number, I surmise that the plane is based out of Pensacola 
Jacksonville Naval Station

.The A10 Tank Killer, we Army guys love the A10, it would have been our edge against the wave of Soviet Armor as they flowed out of the Fulda Gap if WWIII had started, but the A10 romped amongst Saddam's Armor formation in Desert Storm and made quite an impression amongst the survivors.  It is one of the few planes that to my knowledge is NEVER offered for foreign sales but the Airforce keeps trying to kill the plane because they don't like ground support.missions.

The KC-135, a plane based on the "Dash 80", the prototype that was the inspiration for this plane and the Boeing 707.   They are similar but not the same airplane. 

The Tail of the KC135.  The Alabama ANG supplied the F16's from last year.

We also had this huge American flag that my employer uses for special occasions.

Another View

Also there there were several vehicles present.

The M1009 "CUCV"

A couple of funny stories from my first unit.  We had the colonels driver, this guy was an arrogant prick btw, he took the colonels CUCV romping on the tank trails at Honenfels and he figured he would splash one of the puddles on the tank trail....well he did more than that....he sank the vehicle in the tank trail...all you could see was the antenna's sticking out of the water...We called him the U-boat commander after that.  But that wasn't the end...what did it for him was that USAREUR has an oil analysis lab that analyzed the oil in all the vehicles to try to gauge the health of the vehicles.  Well  the test was done every 6 months and for 2 checks, they found metal shavings in the oil samples of the colonel's vehicle..Well they started investigating because the CUCV was new when issued and they found out that the driver was racing on the autobahns with the vehicle, by far exceeding the mandated speed limit set.  Well he got bumped.   We laughed our butts off....couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

The M38A1

The successor of the WWII "Jeep" and before my M151A1 jeep that I drove at my first Duty station

Baggage Cart..

My Employer has a specialized team that greets Soldiers that have died on America's battlefields and they have equipment dedicated for this use only and nothing else, they are painted a certain color and when they are not being used, they are parked under a concourse out of the weather.  

This is a video of the event.

The carts hold the challenge coins and various memorabilia since this got started several years ago.

The guy that started this was a mechanic on the line and he never served but his sons did and he wanted to do something that honored their sacrifice and it took off. This brings great credit on him, and the employer.

One of the tables of various stuff that we brought in to add to the festivities.

Some of my stuff, from my Soviet and East German Stuff to my 

Beer steins.  I could have brought more stuff but I still feel weird showing my 

stuff to other people.