“Don’t forget the true north” (Photo Illustration: Jared Morgan)
By Jamie Brassard, 2nd Vice Commander, District 1
Believe it or not, there are veterans who live in the “True North” of California. The Golden State doesn’t end when you get to Sacramento.
There are 14 posts in District 1, which includes Mendocino, Humboldt, and Del Norte counties. We all live and work everyday for our veterans who live in the area. Del Norte has one American Legion post, Gasquet American Legion Post 548, maybe 10 miles from the Oregon border. You practically can’t get any further north. We are 18 miles from picturesque Crescent City, and we are the home for the Six Rivers National Recreation Area, and I live just off the Smith River.
We are a small post of 69 members with the average age of 66 years young, but we do what we can do for our members with limited incomes and who need assistance. Each year we put on an after-Christmas dinner for our veterans where we take them out for a special night in the community as a thank you for their service.
Gasquet also has the famous Gasquet Raft Race each year that is attended by close to 600 people. It is our fundraiser and it helps keep our post alive and able to help the veterans. Being that we are situated in the Six Rivers National Forest Gasquet Ranger District, we are in the woods so to speak.
We have a population of about 600-plus, with, unfortunately, quite a few homeless veterans. Our service officer in Crescent City has their hands tied when it comes to this problem. We are working hard to help with this situation by giving them a helping hand but first we must be able locate them and offer the help.
We also don’t have a lot of funds to spread out, but we do have a youth baseball team and a nursing scholarship program. We help Crescent City for the Veterans Day parade and other veterans projects. We also help the Mountain School with funds and other small things with its annual Feed Gasquet Thanksgiving Dinner, where the whole community is invited for Thanksgiving dinner at no charge.
Since there are no other Legion posts in Del Norte County, we have members from Crescent City, Smith River and even Brookings Oregon. We are a diverse group of people who try their hardest to assist the veterans in our area. We have strived to help everyone we can.
The people of our community have also strived to help us, to include one family was able to purchase rain boots and socks to give every veteran who wanted a pair. It was a very kind thing for these children to do and every veteran that showed up was given a set. Did I mention this was done all by the children of the community?
Humboldt County is a larger area of the northern end of the state with a much larger veteran population. There are 5 posts with a total of 414 members of The American Legion. They are quite active with the Honor Program which means that they attend every military funeral they can to honor a fallen veteran.
They help our veterans get the benefits they are entitled to and to help the children and youth of their county to succeed in whatever they can. They sponsor an American Legion Baseball team and go out of their way to give back to the community efforts to build a safe and welcoming area.
Finally, we have Mendocino County, which has seven American Legion posts that are engaged in making sure that the veterans are taken care of. They presently have 366 members. They too honor all our deceased veterans and take care of their own. Sequoia Post 96 was recently honored by the Fort Bragg Mayor with a plaque of Distinction for the hard work and dedication to the community, state and nation.
Post 96 is very involved with our community. We sponsor the 4th of July and Police Activities League. We conduct full Military Honors, Memorial Day and Veterans Day
services.
We honor our first responders with an annual dinner and awards.
Post 76 and Post 96 both have 100 years of continued service. As you can tell, District 1 is a large but spread out area, but we do our best to serve our outstretched communities.
Author: caLegion Contributor
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