For veterans like Terry Wilson, the U.S. flag means a lot.
So it was no surprise that one of his bucket list items was to have a massive flagpole installed on his property.
Two of his neighbors, Wayne Gray and John Sauter, decided to surprise Wilson by installing a giant flagpole for his birthday over this summer. Sauter is a Marine Corps veteran, currently farms and used to be an electrician, while Gray is a farmer as well.
All three of their families have known each other for generations.
“I’ve been more than blessed with friendship with Terry’s family for more than 30 years,” Sauter said.
Wilson is currently a physician assistant at Steck Medical Group in Chehalis. The 76-year-old is battling cancer resulting from his exposure to Agent Orange during his time deployed in Vietnam as a U.S. Navy corpsman with Marine Corps units. Sauter deployed to Vietnam as well.
“I remember going out on patrols and the planes would fly over dropping Agent Orange, and it would be dripping off our helmets,” Wilson said. “But nobody knew how bad it was then.”
After serving in the Navy for four years, Wilson worked as a civil servant along with his work as a physician assistant. He was the Lewis County coroner from 1982 to 2010.
Sauter had a 35-foot flagpole in his yard, so he and Gray decided to go ahead and install it in Wilson’s yard.
“He had the pole for a few years,” Gray added.
While 35 feet is tall for a flagpole, it wasn’t tall enough, Sauter said.
“Sitting up here on the road as you drive by, the top edge of the flag would have barely cleared the house’s roofline,” Sauter said.
Using Sonotube and aluminum, they added 5 feet of height to the flagpole. Both Gray and Sauter poured the concrete base and installed the flagpole successfully.
Given the treatment of Vietnam veterans when they initially returned from the war in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, and how some people now frequently disrespect the flag on social media and in the news, Wilson was extremely thankful to have the flag flying high in his yard now.
“It means everything to me. The flag is a symbol of our freedom and our country, and it’s something to be respected,” Wilson said.
