LEWISTON – As Dakota Bisson made her Valentine’s Day card, she thought about her grandfather. He is a veteran. He’s the only one she knows who’s gone to war.
And so with him in mind, Dakota, 8, pasted a large pink heart on one side of her red paper card. On the other side she wrote a letter, addressing it in slanting print to “Togus Veterans.”
“You will have so much help from there people,” she wrote. “They must be good to you. I hope there good.”
She carefully placed the card in a pile of red, pink and purple cards from McMahon Elementary School students. All are bound for veterans at the Togus VA Medical Center.
Coordinated by veteran Jerry DeWitt, the annual Valentine’s Day project collects and sends hundreds of cards to hospitalized veterans in Togus. McMahon Elementary, which was named after a Lewiston soldier killed in Vietnam, participates every year.
“It makes the kids think about those people who have been fighting for us for years,” said nurse Yvette Rousseau, who coordinates the school’s card program every year.
This year, at least 100 McMahon students made valentines, including kids in several second-, fourth- and sixth-grade classes.
“Those who served our country deserve a very special gift, the gift that you can’t play with or touch. The gift of honor,” wrote one fourth-grader, signing the card simply “Alli.”
Lucas Rushton, whose father recently returned home from a tour of duty, made two cards with his second-grade class last week. On the front of one he placed a small peace-symbol sticker. Inside he wrote, “Thank you for keeping us safe.”
He had his dad in mind when he wrote it.
“I was just thinking about how to cheer him up,” said Lucas, 7.
In another class on Monday, Trevor Liick, 7, created his own character – Bob the Whale – and sprinkled his valentine liberally with Bob cartoons done in pencil. He wanted to make veterans laugh, he said, “because they were fighting the bad people.”
All of McMahon’s cards will be collected this week, along with cards from third-graders at Dunn School in New Gloucester, pre-schoolers at a local day-care center and individual area residents. The cards will be delivered to Togus a few days before Valentine’s Day. Extra cards will be sent to troops serving overseas.
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