Dalton turns out to salute veterans at parade

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November 14, 2009

By Rachel Brown

Ron and Judy Parker don’t have family in Charlie Troop, but that didn’t stop them from bringing their flags, their enthusiasm and their chocolate Labrador Snickers to the parade on Saturday.

Hundreds of people lined the streets of downtown Dalton for the city’s annual Veterans Day Parade, many of them waving flags, taking pictures or recording the event with their digital camcorders.

“We need to support all of our military personnel,” Ron Parker said.

The Parkers said both of their fathers served in the Army during World War II. Among the hundreds of flags in memory of local veterans on the courthouse lawn were Stars and Stripes dedicated to John E. Parker, who served in France and Belgium, and Ernest D. Holland, who was in Japan and the Philippines.

Ellie Szollosi of Dalton said her now deceased husband was in the Navy during World War II but served stateside. She has two grandchildren who were playing in the Northwest High School marching band. Her daughter, Nancy Szollosi, said she knew she had to come to the parade this year after her sister told her it was only sparsely attended last year.

“We’ve got a lot of guys over there (overseas) right now,” she said. “Anything we can do to support them, I think we should do.”

The parade featured marching bands from Dalton High, Northwest Whitfield High and Southeast High as well as the JROTC programs from Dalton and Murray County High schools. VFW, American Legion, Shriners and other patriotic organizations created floats or groups to march in the band as did several local Girl and Boy scout troops.

J.O. Partain, an Alpharetta resident who was visiting his son, Superior Court Judge Jack Partain of Dalton, said he was impressed with the parade and festivities. He was 23 with a wife when he was called from his home in Buckhead to join the Army. He would be gone for two years, serving in the Philippines and New Guinea.

Now 92, Partain said veterans were treated with respect when they came back from World War II, unlike they were after their return from Vietnam.

“At that time, everybody had an interest,” he said. “Everybody was in World War II in some way.”

Col. Tom Carden, director of military personnel for the Georgia Army National Guard, spoke to more than 200 people gathered for a ceremony on the courthouse steps after the parade. He praised people in Dalton for supporting their troops through sending cards and packages, offering respect and coordinating other morale boosters.

“If every town in America was like Dalton, Ga., I just don’t believe we’d be in the eighth year of this war,” he said. “You can’t win a war if only the military mobilizes, but you will always win a war when the nation mobilizes.”