Avon VFW Post Holding Annual Poppy Drive

The Gildo T. Consolini VFW Post 3272 in Avon will be hosting its annual poppy drive from now until May 24.

Military veterans of the Avon Post, with the help of the VFW Ladies Auxiliary, will be distributing poppies at Walmart in Avon, Stop & Shop in Simsbury, and Shop Rite in Canton during the event.

While it is not required, donations are accepted.

Last year, the Post raised over $22,000 which was distributed to a few of the highest rated national causes, but mostly local ones – such as the very active Veterans Oasis Centers at Tunxis Community College and Central Connecticut State University, Connecticut’s Operation Stand Down for homeless veterans, Simsbury Veteran Memorial Fund, Veterans Home in Rocky Hill, and the Iwo Jima Memorial in New Britain.

The Post also sends relief packages to current military servicemen and women from the area. As this mission is of highest importance to the members of the Avon Post, they do not keep any of the donations received during their annual buddy poppy drive event.

The familiar red paper poppy, normally worn in the lapel, is a symbol from WWI memorialized in a poem written in 1915 by John McCrae about Flanders Field, Belgium, where, in 1914, American soldiers were engaged in battle in the fields of poppies that grew there.

Historically, the VFW conducted its first buddy poppy distribution before Memorial Day in 1922, becoming the first veterans’ organization to organize a nationwide distribution. The buddy poppy soon was adopted as the official memorial flower of the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States.

In order to make a private donation to the poppy drive, checks can be made out and sent to Avon VFW Post 3272, P.O. Box 297, Avon, CT 06001.