Reflection, Call to Service Mark Memorial Day Ceremony

Teaneck recognized Memorial Day with a ceremony on the Municipal Green honoring members of the armed forces who made the ultimate sacrifice in service to their country. 

A large crowd turned out for the ceremony, organized by the Township Council and Patriotic Observance Advisory Board, with many gathering on the Municipal Green near where the band performed among the flagpole and wreaths honoring the fallen. 

As the speakers addressed the crowd, behind them stood dozens of white crosses and stars with the names of fallen service members.

John McGilchrist, chairman of Teaneck’s Patriotic Observance Advisory Board, presided over the event. McGilchrist is a Vietnam War veteran and a retired colonel in the U.S. Army.

Speakers included Mayor Mohammed Hameeduddin, Deputy Mayor Adam Gussen, who recited the Gettysburg Address, and Councilwoman Barbara Ley Toffler, who read the poem The Soldier’s Right and spoke about her uncle who died while serving in WWII.

Hameeduddin said as he reflected that morning on how best to capture the meaning of Memorial Day for his speech, he thought about a way in which to honor the men and women who gave up their lives in service to the country.

“The one thing that I can do is commit to do one act of volunteerism to honor those men and women who gave up their lives,” he said. “It doesn’t have to be something big; it could be mowing your neighbor’s lawn or taking out your neighbor’s garbage. It could be visiting a sick person in a hospital. I ask that all of you dedicate yourselves to doing just one act of volunteerism this summer just to honor those men and women.”

Township historian Larry Robertson was the first of two guest speakers. He took to the podium to talk about two Teaneck residents who died in the Vietnam War: Stanley F. Reed and Walter Campbell. 

“Both died nobly for their country at a time when a lot of people in the country didn’t want to know anything about the military or hated the military,” Robertson said. “That didn’t stop them. Both men enlisted, and they overcame societal pressure against the military to do a good job.”

The second guest speaker was First Sgt. Minnie Hiller-Cousins, who is an Iraq War veteran and served in the New Jersey Army National Guard in various assignments, such as assisting soldiers in career development, monitoring a teen sponsorship program and starting the food pantry at the .

Hiller-Cousins praised Teaneck for the way it honors its veterans and remembers their service. She thanked residents for coming out in the past to support the men and women who were being deployed from the Armory.

“The children came out, the seniors came out, the adults came out, the retirees, the veterans – we pulled together as one,” she said.

She said one place where the country “is falling short” is in the way it’s forgetting about the veterans who are still alive who served in the Korean and Vietnam wars.

“We must never forget them,” she said to applause from the crowd.

She described how her uncle, who served in Vietnam, never got a ‘thank you’ or a hand-clap when he returned home but instead got spit on or had things thrown at him.

Hiller-Cousins asked adults to encourage youngsters to join the American Legion and VFWs and to volunteer at veteran’s nursing homes and to get to know their veteran neighbors.

“We live in a society that quickly forgets the price of freedom,” she said. “But we must all remember that freedom does not come cheap – that today, there’s a soldier who woke up this morning on the battlefield. That soldier has a home that they left, family that they left behind. And yet we still find soldiers who don’t even get one letter because they have no one to receive a letter from.”

She concluded by telling the crowd to reach out to their long-distance veteran relatives and to visit cemeteries and place flags at the tombs of veterans.

“And most of all, remember each other and remember peace comes with love,” she said.

REMEMBERING THE SERVICE OF OTHERS

Vietnam veterans John Santaella and Ron Dubois said they came to honor those who gave up their lives in service to this country.

“I had a brother lost in Korea, so I’m honoring him,” said Santaella.

DuBois, of Bogota, said he hasn’t missed Teaneck’s Memorial Day ceremony in years.

“One of my good friends, who I served with, was killed in Vietnam,” DuBois said. “And I have family who luckily were only wounded in WWII but didn’t die. So, I consider it my duty to come out and remember these people and to remember what they did for us so we could be here today.”

Adam Baer, combat medic and Teaneck Volunteer Ambulance Corps member, served in Haiti last year after an earthquake devastated the country. He said his grandfather was a Korean War veteran and his uncle was a Vietnam War veteran. He said during the ceremony he thought about his relatives, as well as his friend, Pfc. Paul Cuzzupe, who was killed last year in Afghanistan by an IED.

“I was close with him during my training,” Baer said of Cuzzupe. “It’s important to come out and remember people like him.”

Baer said that other than going to Haiti last summer he hasn’t been called yet to serve overseas.

“I’m one of those people that are hoping to go overseas,” he said. “It’s just something I feel like I have to do.”