The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Students learn flag etiquette
Local veterans delivered a lesson on patriotism to Riverside Schools.
Dean Bader, veteran and owner of Digital Imaging Specialists, sponsored a flag etiquette program for fifthgraders in the district.
“We wanted to teach the fifth-graders and then give them some responsibility, so that they will teach the fourth-graders,” he said.
“There was a time in this district that this was taught to every class and it is still important for students to learn how to properly use and treat the flag.”
Scott Wallace and Robert Horvath, American Legion Painesville Post 336 members, presented the first flag etiquette class to Madison Avenue Elementary School in Painesville Township on Sept. 21.
Wallace and Horvath taught students about the history of the flag: the meaning of its colors, stripes and stars; how to present it; how to fold it; the proper way of raising and lowering it and the appropriate way to store it when it is removed from display.
“Everything that involves the flag has etiquette to it, so that it is done properly and with great respect at all times,” Wallace said.
In detailing the use of the flag, Horvath said that the flag should be honored, for it is placed on the caskets of military veterans, police and firefighters, and public servants; presented at funerals and given to the deceased person’s family members, and carried in the front of processional lines.
The students also received handouts that correspond with their curriculum from fourth- and fifthgrade history class related to the flag folding ceremony.
Bader and his wife Barbara have donated more than 100 American flags to the district to be displayed at every school.
“There are a lot of families that made the ultimate sacrifice, whether it was the husband, wife, son, daughter, or the 50,000 in Vietnam alone, so that this flag can fly,” Bader said. “It means so much to me.”