SEQUIM — Sunscreen, beef jerky and paperbacks turned into “a great force multiplier,” in the words of Army commanding officer Howard Franklin in Camp Bucca, Iraq.
“Our hats are off to you,” Franklin wrote in a letter to the residents of Dungeness Courte, an Alzheimer’s care home in Sequim.
Franklin’s letter, addressed “to the Greatest Generation of Americans,” came with an American flag.
Monday morning, the Courte’s residents gathered for photos with the flag, and listened as administrator Kathy Burrer read the letter aloud.
Packages sent
The flag and greetings were a gesture of thanks for 30 care packages, stuffed with cookies, books such as “The Hobbit,” Pez candy dispensers, cribbage boards and other goodies, mailed from Sequim to Franklin’s troops in Iraq.
Kathy Barbieri of Port Angeles met the Courte residents last spring as she was preparing to send a few things to her husband, 1st Lt. Brandon Barbieri, who is serving in Iraq.
When she arrived at the care home, she found tables laden with snacks, games and books — much more than she’d expected — and learned that many Courte residents had been part of an earlier war effort.
Alice Taylor, for example, was “Rosie the riveter,” Dee Willson was a U.S. Coast Guard radio operator on Ediz Hook, Lorna Cockrill was a parachute packer in the Canadian Air Force, Bill Doonan was a member of the U.S. Marine Corps and Frank Chambers was a Royal Air Force pilot — all serving during World War II, said Dungeness Courte program director Betty Wray.