A five-hundred mile bicycle ride in four days to honor the fallen. A story of veterans seeking solace through remembrance.
A five-hundred mile bicycle ride in four days to honor the fallen. A story of veterans seeking solace through remembrance.
Gold Star Mission, veterans seeking solace through remembrance
Five hundred miles. Four days. On a bicycle. Fort Defiance, Cairo, lllinois; site of Grant’s Civil War headquarters, at the confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, to St. Charles, Illinois, hometown of Staff Sergeant Jacob Frazier, killed in action, Afghanistan, March 29, 2003. He was the Illinois National Guard’s first casualty in the post 9-11 wars.
Thirty-five riders in nearly identical blue and gold bicycling jerseys riding the first Gold Star Mission 500. Nearly identical because thirty-four of the jerseys each bore a different name. Each jersey bore the name of one of the thirty-four casualties the Illinois National Guard had taken in the wars since 9-11. The thirty-fifth jersey, the one I wore, bore no name.
Each of the riders bearing a name were riding in honor of that lost soldier or airman. I rode in honor of them all.
For those not familiar with Midwestern geography, riding from Cairo, Illinois to St. Charles, Illinois, is roughly the equivalent of riding from Richmond, Virginia to Boston. Starting in the northern-most reaches of the Mississippi delta flood plain, traversing the eastern-most ridges of the Ozark Mountain plateau, passing through the deep black prairie dirt furrowed by corn and soybean fields of Central Illinois, ending in the freeways and suburban tract homes of the Chicago suburbs, is four days of battling scorching sun, rolling hills, humidity ended only briefly by pounding thunderstorms and the monotony of spinning pedals to stay with the peloton.
Riders must keep constant vigilance so they don’t touch wheels causing multiple cyclists to crash. A crash can mean broken bones, broken carbon framed bicycles and bloody pavement. Boredom and inattention an ever-present danger. The sweat runs down their faces, drips on the expensive bicycles, then to the pavement sliding beneath the churning legs.
Come to think of it, not a helluva lot different than serving in the Army. Hours of sheer boredom followed by intense moments of sheer terror.
“We’ve got to average sixteen point four miles per hour,” the first morning, pre-dawn briefing, begins. “To make it to St. Charles in four days. We’ll take a ten-minute break every hour, but when it’s time to saddle up, we gotta saddle up and roll.”
Every few hours the peloton, escorted fore and aft by Illinois State Police motorcycles, with red and blue lights spinning, warning oncoming traffic of the sweating riders, rolls through a small town, past the grade school, with students waving flags and holding up signs. Waving to the students, the riders pedal on to swing in to the VFW or the American Legion, where sometimes it’s a handful of veterans greeting them to a lunch of soup and sandwiches.
Sometimes the volunteer fire department has a ladder truck on either side of Main Street, with the largest American flag in town stretched between he extended ladders, to welcome the riders to lemonade and cookies. Sometimes it’s the column wheeling in formation, as one long segmented body into the parking lot of the local National Guard armory. Greeted by a few uniformed soldiers, a lone cameraman from the local tv station, with the row of American flags, like the ones kids wave at Fourth of July parades, lining the entryway, fluttering in the late summer breeze.
Some of the riders sport the lean, chiseled physique of tri-athletes. Others a belly that betrays their years away from the rigors of the military. Ages from early twenties to late seventies, nearly all veterans. All giving up hours over the spring and summer to train in preparation for the mission. All volunteering to endure four days of perching on a narrow saddle, while hunched over handlebars with one eye on the cyclist in front and another on the cyclist in back. Using up vacation time. No trophy, no prize money, no glory at the finish line.
Why do they do it? The stated reason is to raise scholarship funds to honor the memory of Illinois servicemembers lost since 9-11. Gold Star Mission, Inc., is a non-profit organization set up by veterans and Illinois National Guard current and former members to honor the memories of those lost in combat in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. The group initially wanted to honor the thirty-four Illinois Guardsmen lost. After hearing from Illinois Gold Star family members whose servicemembers were not Guardsmen, the group expanded its focus to honor Illinois servicemembers lost from all branches of the military. Gold Star families are those families who have lost a servicemember in wartime.
Several of the founders were avid bicyclists. They decided to raise the funds by riding five hundred miles in four days, the length of Illinois, stopping at National Guard armories along the way.
Five hundred miles in four days was selected so as to make the ride an arduous, painful experience. Nothing like the pain experienced by a Gold Star family, but a reminder to the riders of that pain suffered by the families.
Along with the volunteers, riders, volunteer firemen and veterans’ organization members who greeted them at every town, were the volunteers who drove the support vehicles. The volunteers who made sure there were cold drinks and snacks at every rest stop. The volunteers who stood watch at intersection after intersection, in the heat and humidity, to ensure the safety of the riders. Most of those volunteers are veterans or Gold Star family members.
One of the volunteers, a crusty old retired sergeant major said to me, as we pulled into a National Guard armory to spend the night on cots, “General, I can’t tell you how any times I cried today. I didn’t know how much grief I was carrying inside me. To be part of this helps.”
I replied, “Sergeant Major, I cried too.” As you glance ahead to make sure you’re maintaining a proper interval you catch a glimpse of a name etched in gold on blue background, the tears come. He or she was part of our team. We ride together as a team. We ride to honor them. At every rest stop, at every armory, at every press conference, as we ride, one rider shouts: “Always remember!” In unison the response comes from all, “Never forget!”
Gold Star Mission, as of this writing, has given one-hundred-thirty, one thousand dollar scholarships in memory of the Illinois fallen. Each of those scholarship recipients is charged with remembering the fallen.
Gold Star Mission is just one of hundreds, maybe thousands of organizations started by veterans, for veterans, and their families to aid them, to support them and to honor the memory of the fallen. These organizations are grassroots responses to fill a need.
The effect of these organizations has not only been to assist veterans and their families, but also to assist the members and participants of the organization themselves. Many soldiers returning from combat deployments, whether active duty, Guard or reserve, deal with varying degrees of anger, depression, anxiety or other stress indicators. For some, these may be symptoms of post-traumatic stress. For others it is unresolved grief due to the loss of friends. By working as part of a team with others who understand where they have been, participants in these organizations assuage their guilt and grief.
The sergeant major’s tears and my tears watered our healing process.
© William L. Enyart 2020