A field of bright red oversized poppies sprung up today on the front lawn of the Southold American Legion post on Main Road.
Every one of the 329 poppies was handcrafted by Legion member Joseph St. Pierre out of plastic soda bottle bottoms. St. Pierre worked on the flowers throughout the past year, since his wife Donna, a member of the American Legion Auxiliary came up with the idea — it came to her in a dream, she says — around Memorial Day last year.
For the flowers, St. Pierre cut the bottoms off 2-liter plastic bottles donated by Poliwoda Beverage. He spray-painted them with bright high-gloss reds and oranges. He painted the washers and nuts he used to affix them to their “stems” made from threaded rods. Each poppy took him about 45 minutes to make, he said today.
“We originally thought maybe we’d make 100 of them,” St. Pierre said.
But the idea took root and St. Pierre, a retired builder and Vietnam veteran, made more than triple the number he’d originally planned.
Photo: Denise Civiletti
The Auxiliary requested a $20 donation for each poppy, in memory or in honor of veterans and active members of the armed forces, both living and deceased. Each poppy bears a satin ribbon inscribed with the name, rank and branch of service of the military member in whose honor it stands. The proceeds of the poppy sales are being donated to Boots on the Ground NY, a Ronkonoma-based nonprofit dedicated to supporting and assisting veterans.
The group does a lot of work with veterans coping with post-traumatic stress disorder, said St. Pierre, a Vietnam veteran who served in 1964-1965.
That work is important to fellow Legion member and Vietnam vet Carl Deliteris, who suffered from PTSD for years before it was a clinical diagnosis. Deliteris served in the Army’s 25th Infantry Division in Vietnam during 1966-1967. The nightmares still come, he said — less frequently now, 50 years later. But they still haunt him.
“When you see human legs flying through the air, that’s not something you ever forget,” Deliteris said. “And unless you’ve lived through it, you really don’t know.”
Three of the four buddies he went through basic training with were killed in action in Vietnam, Deliteris said. He bought a poppy in memory of each of them.
“This looks incredibly fabulous,” Deliteris said, standing on the lawn gazing at the field of poppies this afternoon. “It’s really something else.”
The Auxiliary members, who have a poppy committee that distributes red paper poppies every year before Memorial Day, accepting free-will donations to support veterans’ groups, are finding that each year, fewer people know what the poppies symbolize, said Donna St. Pierre, a member of the poppy committee.
“More and more people ask us what the poppies are about and why we’re distributing them,” she said.
The paper poppies — and now their large plastic counterparts at the American Legion post — reminiscent of the wild poppies blooming in the battle fields of France during WWI – are symbols of the sacrifices made by the men and women who served and died for their country during a time of war.
Distribution of the red paper poppies, many (though not all) of which are made by hospitalized veterans in VA hospitals or nursing homes, has been an American Legion national program since 1924. It can be traced to a New York City woman named Moina Michael, who was so moved by the words of the poem, “In Flanders Fields” that she began distributing fresh poppies in 1918 and spearheaded a campaign that would result in the adoption of the poppy as the national symbol of sacrifice.
“In Flanders Fields” is a war poem written during World War I by Canadian Lt. Col. John McCrae on May 3, 1915, after presiding over the funeral of a friend and fellow soldier:
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
“We hope this field of poppies serves as a reminder of the sacrifices made by our service members and will help raise awareness of the poppy symbol,” St. Pierre said.
SoutholdLOCAL photos by Denise Civiletti
Correction: The Legion Auxiliary distributes paper poppies each year and accepts free-will donations from the public. The poppies are not sold by the group, as originally stated in this article.
