A surprising connection
Katelyn Hayden and Monique Hale pose in the room Hale handed off to Hayden earlier this year at the naval facility in Sasebo, Japan. Both are members of the same Legion post.

A surprising connection

American Legion Post 9 in Madison, Ind. - population around 12,000 - draws its membership from an extended geographic area of small towns fairly similar to Madison. So a meeting between two young female sailors at the U.S. Fleet Activities naval facility at Sasebo, Japan, earlier this year was slightly less unusual - but only slightly. Post member Scott Crawford reports that when transitioning-out Monique Hale met transitioning-in Katelyn Hayden, the woman she would be handing her quarters off to, they discovered in their conversation while briefly sharing the room that they were both new members of Post 9, having both recently joined the Legion.

Hayden is from Madison, and Hale is from Ghent, Ky., about 20 miles away. They share the same MOS: master-at-arms. Hale’s father Bart (himself a retired Marine), who snapped a picture of the two, commented on his daughter’s reaction: “She thought it was pretty cool ... thousands of miles from home.”

A little more precisely, Infoplease.com says it’s just a shade under 7,000 miles from Madison to Sasebo.