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Following is a list of 45 things you can do to honor a Veteran, developed by the Behavioral Health staff at the Spokane VA Medical Center. Our Veterans selflessly serve our Country for our freedom. Let’s not take this lightly. Honor our Veterans any day of the year by picking one of this suggestions. But most of all, let our Veterans know how much they mean to you.

1. Attend a Veteran’s Day event.
2. Ask a Veteran about their time in the military, and really listen to the answer.
3. Hang a flag in your yard.
4. Ask an aging Veteran to share with you the song that most takes them back.
5. Visit the gravesite of a Veteran.
6. Visit a homebound Veteran in their home, talk with them, and thank them for their service.
7. Visit a homeless Veteran under a bridge, and do the same.
8. Take a Veteran out to dinner.
9. Take dinner in to a Veteran.
10. Tell someone (your family, a friend, a neighbor) about an experience you had serving a Veteran at the VA.
11. Take flowers to a Veterans memorial.
12. Write and send a letter to someone who’s currently serving in the military.
13. Ask a neighbor about their deployment.
14. Call a Veteran family member.
15. Thank a Veteran co-worker for their service.
16. Take a private moment to be proud of your country.
17. Teach someone (a child, a friend, a neighbor) what it means to be a Veteran.
18. Share pictures of a Veteran with someone.
19. Say a silent prayer for those who are serving.
20. Learn about a current or past war/conflict (this will make you a better helper).
21. Look up your ancestry and learn about someone in your family who was a Veteran.
22. Hug your family, and tell them that it’s thanks to Veterans that you get to.
23. Buy a homeless Veteran a cup of coffee.
24. Observe a moment of silence with family and friends.
25. Read something a Veteran wrote about their experience.
26. Wear your favorite “Pro-Vet” T-Shirt. (Examples: Free Hugs for Vets; Remember Our Fallen Veterans; Freedom is not FREE…; Thank a VETERAN; I Heart Veterans!).
27. Buy a Buddy Poppy. Wear it all day, attach it to your purse or bag and keep it there until it falls apart. When people ask what it is, tell them.
28. Read and share the poem “In Flanders Field the poppies grow”.
29. Make sure your children and grandchildren know who the Veterans are within their own family, and share the family stories with them.
30. Do a project about Veterans with young children or grandchildren. For example, let them make their own Veteran flag and plant it in a pot of flowers in front of the house.
31. Write on your blog about your appreciation for Veterans.
32. Help young children or grandchildren make a thank you card, and post them in the window or at a grocery store bulletin board or library or some other public place.
33. (Good for any day:) Stand out in front of the VA greet Veterans as they are being dropped off at the door. Some older folks even need a hand getting out of the car.
34. Tell a loved one about serving Veterans.
35. Donate time or money or supplies to local Veterans Day drives.
36. Volunteer to help a Veteran’s Service Organization (there are lots!).
37. Take a moment to reflect on what it means to live in America.
38. Gather with friends and family and watch a patriotic movie.
39. Go to a Veterans Day parade.
40. Write in your journal how thankful you are for the service of Veterans.
41. Take a quiet moment and imagine hearing “taps” played in your head.
42. Thank a Veteran of his/her service while doing errands.
43. Shake a Veteran’s hand.
44. Send an email that tells a Veteran’s story to the people on your contact list.
45. Pick one or two of the activities listed above, and resolve to do them at least 1 time every month this year when it’s NOT Veteran’s Day.

Article by U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Photo by William Thomas Cain/Getty Images

The 24-note melancholy bugle call known as “taps” is thought to be a revision of a French bugle signal, called “tattoo,” that notified soldiers to cease an evening’s drinking and return to their garrisons. It was sounded an hour before the final bugle call to end the day by extinguishing fires and lights. The last five measures of the tattoo resemble taps.

The word “taps” is an alteration of the obsolete word “taptoo,” derived from the Dutch “taptoe.” Taptoe was the command — “Tap toe!” — to shut (“toe to”) the “tap” of a keg.

The revision that gave us present-day taps was made during America’s Civil War by Union Gen. Daniel Adams Butterfield, heading a brigade camped at Harrison Landing, Va., near Richmond. Up to that time, the U.S. Army’s infantry call to end the day was the French final call, “L’Extinction des feux.”Gen. Butterfield decided the “lights out” music was too formal to signal the day’s end. One day in July 1862 he recalled the tattoo music and hummed a version of it to an aide, who wrote it down in music.

Butterfield then asked the brigade bugler, Oliver W. Norton, to play the notes and, after listening, lengthened and shortened them while keeping his original melody.

He ordered Norton to play this new call at the end of each day thereafter, instead of the regulation call. The music was heard and appreciated by other brigades, who asked for copies and adopted this bugle call. It was even adopted by Confederate buglers. This music was made the official Army bugle call after the war, but not given the name “taps” until 1874.

The first time taps was played at a military funeral may also have been in Virginia soon after Butterfield composed it. Union Capt. John Tidball, head of an artillery battery, ordered it played for the burial of a cannoneer killed in action. Not wanting to reveal the battery’s position in the woods to the enemy nearby, Tidball substituted taps for the traditional three rifle volleys fired over the grave.

Taps was played at the funeral of Confederate Gen. Stonewall Jackson 10 months after it was composed. Army infantry regulations by 1891 required taps to be played at military funeral ceremonies. Taps now is played by the military at burial and memorial services, to accompany the lowering of the flag and to signal the “lights out” command at day’s end.

A Series by Lishamarie Hunter

This is the first in a four part series highlighting females accomplishments and the evolution of their services to the country and military. I am Lishamarie Hunter, I am a retired veteran. I spent 25 years in the Army as an Ordnance soldier.

2019 begins with a historical number of women being voted into office so maybe this is a good time to discover how influential women have been in the creation of our democracy. Women have been present on the battlefields since the revolutionary war.

Listed below is a rough timeline of historical advancements for women laying the foundation of what we see within our military, as women take on more roles within the institutions that protect and preserve our democracy.

1775–1783
During the Revolutionary War, women follow their husbands to war out of necessity. Many serve in military camps as laundresses, cooks, and nurses but only with permission from the commanding officers and only if they proved they were helpful.

1782-1783
Deborah Sampson serves for over a year in General Washington’s army disguised as a man. After being wounded, her gender is discovered and she is honorably discharged. Later, she receives a military pension from the Continental Congress.

Deborah Sampson Gannett, better known as Deborah Samson or Deborah Sampson, was a Massachusetts woman who disguised herself as a man in order to serve in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. She is one of a small number of women with a documented record of military combat service.

Molly Pitcher, folk hero or legend? The story goes that Molly Pitcher was believed to have been Mary Ludwig Hays, born circa October 13, 1754, near Trenton, New Jersey. During the American Revolutionary War’s Battle of Monmouth, she carried pitchers of water to soldiers, thereby earning her nickname.

After her husband collapsed during the battle, she took over the operation of his cannon. Honored in 1822 for her bravery, she died in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, on January 22, 1832.

There are many other women who also volunteered their service during the American Revolution and whose lives may have contributed to the legend of Molly Pitcher.

1812
During the War of 1812, two women, Mary Marshall and Mary Allen, serve as nurses for several months aboard the USS United States at the request of Commodore Stephen Decatur.

1846–1848
During the Mexican War, Elizabeth Newcom enlists in the Missouri Volunteer Infantry as Bill Newcom and marches 600 miles to winter camp in Colorado before being discovered and discharged.

1861–1865
During the American Civil War, women serve as matrons (administrators) of hospitals as well as nurses and cooks in both Union and Confederate battlefield hospitals. Wealthy women help fund permanent hospitals. Dr. Mary Walker becomes the only women to receive the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military honor. Women also serve as spies and some, disguised as men, serve as soldiers.

In September 1863, Dr. Walker obtained employment with the War Department, like many male physicians, as a “Contract Acting Assistant Surgeon” – equivalent in pay and authority to a lieutenant or captain depending on length of service and experience. While assigned to the U.S. Army of the Cumberland medical department, and briefly replacing the regimental surgeon of the 52d Ohio Infantry, Mary conspicuously dressed in a modified uniform of her own design: a blue dress resembling an officer’s frock coat, blue trousers with gold piping on the seam, felt hat, and the green sash of a surgeon.

Captured by Confederates in April 1864, she spent four months as a prisoner of war before she and other Union doctors were exchanged for Confederate medical officers.

On her return, the War Department assigned Mary as medical director in a hospital for women prisoners in Louisville, Kentucky, until she left government employment. Commended by Major Generals William T. Sherman and George H. Thomas for meritorious service, President Andrew Johnson awarded her the Medal of Honor on November 11, 1865. The only woman to ever be awarded the Medal of Honor.

1898
During the Spanish-American War, 1,500 civilian women serve as nurses assigned to Army hospitals in the U.S. Hundreds more serve as support staff, spies, and a few disguise themselves as men to serve in the military.

1917–1918
During last two years of World War I, women are allowed to join the military. 33,000 women serve as nurses and support staff officially in the military and more than 400 nurses die in the line of duty.

1941–1945
During World War II, more than 400,000 women serve at home and abroad as mechanics, ambulance drivers, pilots, administrators, nurses, and in other non-combat roles. Women in the Second World War took on many different roles during the War, including as combatants and workers on the home front.

The Second World War involved global conflict on an unprecedented scale; the absolute urgency of mobilizing the entire population made the expansion of the role of women inevitable, although the particular roles varied from country to country. Millions of women of various ages died as a result of the war.

1948
Eighty eight women are captured and held as POWs (prisoners of war) Congress passes the Women’s Armed Services Integration Act granting women permanent status in the military subject to military authority and regulations and entitled to veterans benefits.

1950–1953
During the Korean War, over 50,000 women serve at home and abroad. 500 Army nurses serve in combat zones and many Navy nurses serve on hospital ships.

By Annalisa C. Underwood For Navy Live, Oct 2014

If you’ve ever been to a military ball, stepped inside a chow hall, or attended an event at a military veterans association in your local community, you’ve likely noticed the small, round table that is always set but never occupied—the prisoners of war/missing in action (POW/MIA) table.

The tradition of setting a separate table in honor of our prisoners of war and missing comrades has been in place since the end of the Vietnam War. The manner in which this table is decorated is full of special symbols to help us remember our brothers and sisters in arms.

The POW/MIA table is smaller than the others, symbolizing the frailty of one prisoner alone against his or her oppressors. This table is separate from the others and can be set for one to four place settings to represent each service participating in the event.

The significance of the POW/MIA table is called to attention during the toast of the evening. This is an important part of many military banquets to remind us that the strength of those who fight for our country often times rests in the traditions that are upheld today.

As we celebrate the Navy’s birthday this week and you find yourself at one of the many birthday events that will take place around the world, take the time to reflect on why that small, lone table is there and raise a glass for our fallen comrades.

What to Include:

• The white tablecloth draped over the table represents the purity of their response to our country’s call to arms.
• The empty chair depicts an unknown face, representing no specific Soldier, Sailor, Airman, or Marine, but all who are not here with us.
• The table itself is round to show that our concern for them is never ending.
• The Bible represents faith in a higher power and the pledge to our country, founded as one nation under God.
• The black napkin stands for the emptiness these warriors have left in the hearts of their families and friends. A Purple Heart medal can be pinned to the napkin.
• The single red rose reminds us of their families and loved ones. The red ribbon represents the love of our country, which inspired them to answer the nation’s call.
• The yellow candle and its yellow ribbon symbolize the everlasting hope for a joyous reunion with those yet accounted for.
• The slices of lemon on the bread plate remind us of their bitter fate.
• The salt upon the bread plate represent the tears of their families.
• The wine glass, turned upside down, reminds us that our distinguished comrades cannot be with us to drink a toast or join in the festivities of the evening.