Post Falls volunteers honor veterans with flags at Evergreen Cemetery

Miriam and Bridget Kazda bent with their younger sister, Gianna, to salute the grave of Donald R. Whaley, a World War II veteran and U.S. Marine Corps veteran, as volunteers filled Evergreen Cemetery with American flags in Post Falls. The family scene gave the annual flag placement a deeper edge: this was not only about decorating graves before Memorial Day, but about handing down the meaning of service to children who will decide whether the tradition survives.

American Legion Post 143 members and other volunteers placed between 600 and 700 flags across the cemetery, with Commander Tim Shaw estimating about 660 flags went into the ground that morning. Shaw said the flags represent sacrifice, memory and the cost of freedom, and he described the reverence shown by the children as moving. For Shaw, the work connected Post Falls to a broader patriotic identity, one built not in speeches but in the steady care of veterans’ graves.

That care has become a habit in more than one family. Katie Jennings, who leads the American Heritage Girls troop, said the group has been doing the flag placement with the American Legion for five years. Trail Life troops from Real Life Ministries also take part each year, adding another layer of family participation to the observance. Dan Sweet, another volunteer, said the process is a good learning experience for children, especially when they see veteran tombstones marked with care.

The question now is how long that chain of remembrance will hold if older volunteers step back and younger residents do not step in. Shaw pointed to his own visits to graves in Normandy, where he said the names of the dead must still be spoken because many of the people who knew them are gone. In Post Falls, the same logic applies on a smaller scale: if children stop learning the ritual, the community risks losing not just hands to place the flags, but the memory of why they are there.

The city’s Memorial Day Ceremony was scheduled for Monday, May 25, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Evergreen Cemetery, co-hosted by the City of Post Falls and American Legion Post 143, to honor the men and women who gave their lives in service to the country. Elsewhere in Kootenai County, observances were planned in Rathdrum, Hayden and Coeur d’Alene, with residents encouraged to pause for a moment of silence at 3 p.m. if they could not attend. In Boise, the Idaho Division of Veterans Services held its statewide Memorial Day ceremony at the Idaho State Veterans Cemetery, a 76.5-acre site where the Stars and Stripes flies in silent vigil.