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Rusty Crabtree gives talk during FHS Veterans Day service
FAIRFIELD – Fairfield honored its veterans with a public ceremony Thursday morning held in the auditorium of the Fairfield High School.
The auditorium was packed with students and community members who had come to show their support to those who served. During the ceremony, the FHS band played the official songs of each branch of the military, and veterans in attendance were encouraged to stand when the song of their branch was played.
Ben Boatright and Connor Hawkins led a ceremony on the “Missing Man Table,” where a table on stage has been set for a soldier who did not come home. Everything on the table symbolizes something, such as the roundness of the table representing that concern for the missing man is never ending, a red rose in a vase representing the lives of the soldiers who keep faith while seeking answers, and a slice of lemon representing their bitter fate.
The FHS choir performed the National Anthem, and the choir and band together performed Battle Hymn of the Republic. The Southeast Iowa Regional Fire Honor Guard did the presentation of colors.
This year’s featured speaker was a veteran who also happens to work at the high school, and that was Vannen “Rusty” Crabtree, who is in his first year of teaching Industrial Tech at FHS.
Crabtree was in the U.S. Army for six years, and served in a military intelligence unit during Operation Desert Storm, a response to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Crabtree said part of his mission involved running drones over Iraq and Kuwait.
“We had drones back then, too,” Crabtree said. “Everybody seems to think they’re new, but they’re not as new as people think they are.”
Crabtree said his parents encouraged him to go to college, but he didn’t want to. His dad was a veteran of the Korean War, and asked his son not to follow in his footsteps.
“I was being a stubborn, rebellious kid,” Crabtree said. “My dad had bad experiences in the Korean War, and he didn’t want me to go through the same thing. He was trying to be a good parent.”
After his career as a contractor in Richland, Crabtree decided to enter education. His wife, Lisa, has worked at Pekin for 38 years. Rusty was also the Pekin High School volleyball coach. He became an associate at Pekin a few years ago, and then became an associate at Fairfield last year before becoming an applied science instructor this year.
During his speech, Crabtree said that his time in the military taught him the meaning of loyalty, duty, respect and integrity. He talked about how loyalty refers to fealty to the U.S. Constitution and to his fellow soldiers, about how duty is about accomplishing a task with a team, about how respect means treating others with dignity, and how integrity means doing what’s right, even if nobody is watching.
Crabtree said he tries to impart those same values on his students.
“I tell my students that the Army is one of the best things you can do,” Crabtree said. “It teaches you a lot of different things, like respect, loyalty and honor. It also gives you a chance to travel to other parts of the world, where you can relate to what we’re fighting for, for our freedom. It shows you what others have and what freedoms they don’t have. It helps put it in perspective.”
Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com
