The spirit of the season was on full display at the Gino Merli Veterans Center in Scranton, where veterans were surrounded with some much-needed holiday cheer.<\/p>\n
SCRANTON, Pa. \u2014 Smiles could be seen on the faces of many veterans at the Gino Merli Veterans Center in Scranton as they were greeted by Major General John Pippy, Pennsylvania’s Adjutant General and Head of the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, and other employees, followed by Santa.<\/p>\n
It’s a yearly affair to honor veterans and spread some cheer during the holiday season.<\/p>\n
“Each year, we do luncheons for all of our residents during Christmas time, and a lot of our residents, our veterans they don’t have anybody,” said Vito Ruggiero, Gino Merli Veterans’ Center (GMVC) Commandant.<\/p>\n
But Friday afternoon, veterans here had crowds of people all coming together to honor the incredible sacrifices they’ve made.<\/p>\n
As workers from the department of military and veterans affairs and the Gino Merli Veterans Center arrived at each floor, walked the halls, and said their hellos, a lasting sense of joy filled each room.<\/p>\n
“To see this light in the eyes of the vets, of our residents. You know, that’s why we do it. It’s just awesome,” said Maj. Gen. John Pippy, Pennsylvania’s Adjutant General and Head of DMVA.<\/p>\n
Veterans were not the only ones honored. The DMVA also surprised one of the center’s RNs, Brooke Beppler, with a Pennsylvania National Guard Award of Excellence. \u00a0<\/p>\n
“I was so surprised. I was so happy that not only General Pippy, but that everybody at Gino Merli would take the time out of their day to honor me, and I’m just so appreciative of this award,” said Brooke Beppler, RN at GMVC.<\/p>\n
After years of fighting breast cancer, Beppler is now cancer-free and came right back to take care of the veterans she loves.<\/p>\n
“I always look forward to coming back to work and taking care of the people that always looked out for me and provided for us and for our country,” she said.<\/p>\n
It’s moments like these, where joy, gratitude, and community come together to truly honor the spirit of the season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The spirit of the season was on full display at the Gino Merli Veterans Center in Scranton, where…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":59651,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[178,180,179],"class_list":{"0":"post-59650","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scranton","8":"tag-scranton","9":"tag-scranton-headlines","10":"tag-scranton-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59650\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}