As Greatest Generation fades, Carrabelle remembers

Carrabelle Mayor Brenda La Paz, dressed as Rosie the Riveter, the cultural icon who represented the women who worked in factories and shipyards during World War II, waves from atop a float in the parade. [ David Adlerstein | The Times ]

The Camp Gordon Johnston WWII museum recently acquired this vest, made from a U.S. MD (Medical Department) blanket, that was fashioned by German prisoners of war in 1944 being held in France. They presented it as a going-away present to John Reeder, an American serviceman who was responsible for drawing rations to these 1,500 prisoners.
[ David Adlerstein | The Times ]

This student, a member of The Nest after-school program in Carrabelle, was dressed as an airplane for the parade.
[ David Adlerstein | The Times ]

This float was from the Sons Of Confederate Veterans Wakulla Guards Camp #742. [ David Adlerstein | The Times ]

Dressed in garments from two millennia ago, this float was provided by the First Baptist Church of Carrabelle.
[ David Adlerstein | The Times ]

Lots of World War II military hardware was on display at the parade. [ David Adlerstein | The Times ]

This family got their fill of candy tossed from the parade floats. [ David Adlerstein | The Times ]

Five-year-old Caleb Blevins pondered the question as he sat between his mom and dad on the back of their truck, awaiting the arrival of the 29th annual Camp Gordon Johnston Day Veterans Parade Saturday morning.

What is the purpose of the parade today? he was asked.

“To get candy!” he answered.

Mom Cheree, and dad, Wade, pastor of the Carrabelle Christian Center, both 30-somethings, laughed at his reply.

But as they say, out of the mouths of babes often come unvarnished truths.

“Everything soon will all be ‘in the memory of,’” said Wade. “You don’t meet (that generation) any more.”

Robert Dietz, 94, of Lanark Village, a veteran of the U.S. Navy during World War II, served as the parade’s grand marshal, but beyond him, there were few, if any, veterans of the “Greatest Generation” taking part in the parade.

At one time, veterans stationed at Carrabelle’s Camp Gordon Johnston, an 165,000-acre amphibious training base that rotated between 24,000 and 30,000 soldiers from 1942 through 1946, would hold reunions there every year. Over the last two decades, the reunions gradually faded away, and the weekend-long Camp Gordon Johnston Days event narrowed to a single parade.

The Camp Gordon Johnston World War II Museum continues to ramp up its exhibits to where it holds an impressive collection of memorabilia from that base and that war. Their collection of hardware from the war was on full display to the small crowd that gathered in downtown Carrabelle for the parade.

The parade is primarily a salute to all veterans now, and Saturday was no exception, as vets from Vietnam and later took part, along with a color guard from Franklin County High School’s Cadet Core, politicians of all stripes, motorcycle riders, Shriners, pageant queens, churches, the Nest after-school program and others interested in the commemoration.

Among those who took part were Sons Of Confederate Veterans Wakulla Guards Camp #742, dressed in the gray of the Confederacy and proudly waving the stars-and-bars. A handful of them fired their rifles at the newly expanded Veterans Memorial Park, in salute to the fallen from the branches of service honored there.

Following the parade about 60 or so motorcyclists took part in the fundraising Dice Run around the county. The museum was busy all day as well, showing off its many permanent World War II displays as well as the two special exhibits it has in March, honoring the country’s canine military veterans and illustrating the role of cartoonists in World War II.