Always remember the fallen

Rows of white chairs filled with military veterans and their families and friends looked out on the green grass of the Pacific View Memorial Park in Corona del Mar on Monday morning in observance of Memorial Day.

Keynote speaker and veteran Robert Carolan told the assembled crowd stories of an American man and woman who died in combat in last few years, getting choked up as he called them his heroes.

“Let us remember these fallen comrades not just now but long after we leave here today,” he said.

The act of spending Memorial Day in solemn remembrance of those who have died for their country is less prevalent now than it was decades ago, Steven Spriggs, commander of local American Legion Post 291, said as he thanked those who came to Pacific View.

Silver-haired veterans of the Vietnam and Korean wars dominated the crowd, but there were also several younger troops who had returned from tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Mike Monson, a 26-year-old who has been training to be a Navy doctor for the past three years, confessed that he never really took the time to reflect on the actual significance of the holiday before seeing high school mates go off to war and joining himself. Monson will be ready to deploy in two years, he said.

“Now, having friends who have not come back, it has a much more personal meaning to me,” Monson said after watching the ceremony.

Boys and girls dressed in colonial outfits played fifes and drums, followed by a procession of flags. There was a rifle salute, followed by a solemn trumpet performance of the military funeral dirge “Taps.”

A group of white doves was released into the air, and the crowd adjourned.

Memorial Day Facts

 Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day

 The tradition began after the Civil War in the 1860s

 Gen. John Logan famously proclaimed it a national day of remembrance in 1868