‘We can still thank them, even though we don’t know them’

A solemn hush had fallen over the room, the sixty-some Badger Boys Staters listening in respectful silence as Legionnaire Mark Kramer spoke about the experiences and losses he and his fellow veterans had endured.

Kramer’s talk was a precursor to one of the longstanding traditions at Wisconsin’s Boys State program. Each Boys Stater is required to write a letter to a veteran during their week at the program.

“It brings them a little more in touch with our veterans who are here,” said Kramer, second vice commander at Post 306 in Green Lake, Wis. “They get a chance to relate, maybe, their relatives with the guys that are here in the program. It means a lot to us and they can tell, because it means a lot to them too to see that.”

To help encourage the Boys Staters, Kramer shared his experience serving in the U.S. Army in Vietnam, noting that he and his comrades didn’t really talk about it until a replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall came to Wisconsin in 2013. One of his old classmates pointed out the members of his platoon who had died in an ambush during the war and whose names now graced the wall.

Kramer also talked about some of his high school classmates who died in Vietnam. “It’s important to have these memorials as time passes, because if you can’t see it, it didn’t happen,” he said. He also discussed veterans who had died in Iraq and Afghanistan and the impact their deaths had on their communities.

“Although there have been a lot of veterans that I have interacted with throughout my life, it wasn’t something that I made a greater effort towards. I think doing that letter and listening to the Legionnaire who talked (about it) has made me have a greater appreciation (for them),” said Leo Chen, a Badger Boys Stater from Brookfield.

Chen hoped that his letter would let the veteran who received it “know that the younger generations of Americans … appreciate them and understand that they owe the rights and privileges they enjoy in this country based on their sacrifices.”

“We’re encouraged every day in our society to thank a veteran whenever we see them, but I feel like these (letters) are for veterans we can’t see,” said Jaxon James of Osseo.

In his letter, James noted that veterans serve for people they’ll never meet.

“I’d like to say thank you to all of them, but that’s not possible. This is an opportunity for me to get one more person,” James said. “… Each veteran has their own story, and we might not know it. But we can still thank them, even though we don’t know them.”

The letters from the 680 Badgers Boys Staters were presented to veterans both on staff and in the audience during the program’s inaugural ceremony the evening of June 15.