While Veterans Day is largely intended to thank living Veterans for their service to the country, many people make it a point to stop by the Dallas-Fort Worth National Cemetery to honor veterans who have passed away.<\/p>\n
Large crowds visited despite the cancellation of a Veterans Day event at the cemetery amid the government shutdown.<\/p>\n
Visitors included friends and families whose loved ones served in the Armed Forces.<\/p>\n
Veterans themselves also saw fit to stop by to pay their respects.<\/p>\n
\u201cI served in Vietnam. This is my first time in this cemetery,\u201d said Army Veteran Dan Davis of Royce City. \u201cI have an uncle and an aunt buried here and I just got an approval letter saying that when I passed, I would be buried here, as well as my wife, Sharon.\u201d<\/p>\n
Davis served in the Vietnam War.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m so proud of him,\u201d said wife Sharon.<\/p>\n
Davis was awarded the Bronze Star, though it is still (understandably so), difficult for him to talk about the experience.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, I did my job. That\u2019s all I want to say,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
U.S. Navy Veterans and lifelong friends Mike Marble and Bob Parker of Grand Prairie visited their friend Howard Broadaway\u2019s gravesite along with his widow.<\/p>\n
\u201cI stop by to visit Howard and we got some other friends out here,\u201d said an affable Parker. \u201cAs time marches on, my list is getting longer, unfortunately.\u201d<\/p>\n
When asked what Veterans Day means to him, Davis said, “It\u2019s been a long time since I\u2019ve been in the service, but I have many memories. Some good, some bad. I love America and I want to see America survive for many years to come, but sometimes I wonder if it will.\u201d<\/p>\n
This year, Veterans Day commemorations at the cemetery were affected by the government shutdown.<\/p>\n
The Texas National Cemetery Foundation canceled Tuesday\u2019s elaborate ceremony, posting online that they were unable to secure resources and staff because of the federal impasse.<\/p>\n
It is something Erlinda McGuire-Rios of Fort Worth is deeply disappointed about.<\/p>\n
Her son, U.S. Army Specialist Juan M. Rios, is buried in the national cemetery.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese people here, all of these, they deserve that they deserve the ceremony and because of the ridiculous things going on, things like this is canceled,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd, I am, I\u2019m sorry. I\u2019m very patriotic. I love our country, but I\u2019m embarrassed, honestly.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tom Damura of Arlington wasn\u2019t about to let the failures of Congress stop him from scrounging up his own humble tribute.<\/p>\n
\u201cI told the director here I said if it\u2019s just me, so be it,\u201d said Damura. \u201cNow, we didn\u2019t do anything as grand as a flyover and 21-gun salute\u2026 I started out with flags and a few flowers and this gentleman behind me, he became the trumpeter.. It\u2019s just right. It\u2019s what it\u2019s supposed to be.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While Veterans Day is largely intended to thank living Veterans for their service to the country, many people…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":45778,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[116,118,117,16210],"class_list":{"0":"post-45777","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fort-worth","8":"tag-fort-worth","9":"tag-fort-worth-headlines","10":"tag-fort-worth-news","11":"tag-veterans-day"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45777\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}