The Iola Veterans Day Parade Committee is in need of some extra help — in more ways than one.
The committee has been given the green light from the Allen County Commission to extend its Veterans Memorial Wall on the south side of the square.
Two additional panels will be placed on each side of the memorial, making a total of six panels on which to engrave names of veterans.
Two donations of $1,000 each have already been made to go toward the extension. Each will donor will have a window dedicated in their names.
Alfred Link, retired National Guard sergeant major and leader of the Iola Veterans Committee, would like to see the wall extensions built by Larry Robertson, who built the original walls.
In order to build the additional walls they will need more help with donations.
“We need more money,” Link said. “We are close, but not enough.”
LINK ALSO SAID new and younger people need to join the committee.
“When we first started it in 1989 there were 83 people and now there are only seven,” he said.
The committee meets at 7 p.m. on the third Wednesday of every month at Link’s home at 623 S. Sycamore.
One annual activity is the Nov. 10 Veterans Day parade.
The parade is always held on the 10th and not the 11th, which is Veterans Day, and is at 11 a.m. because World War I hostilities ended the “11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month,” Link said.
For more information on the wall, the committee meetings or to give donations call Link at (620) 365-7149.
