Legion enjoys a banner day in Salt Lake

Salt Lake City could have been renamed Flag Wave City on Sunday.

From the hundreds of American flags sprouting from the lawn between Main Street Plaza and the LDS Church Office Building, to the blizzard of banners moving through streets in the American Legion parade, the capital city was turned into a gigantic display of patriotism.

"Oh, I think it was great," said Patti Murphy, a Moab woman who is a member of the Legion, soon after the two-hour-plus parade ended. "Six bands, for heaven's sakes. And all the people from all over the United States and abroad ...

"I'll tell you what I like. I like seeing the flags go by, and I like seeing the gentlemen — every time there was an American flag go by, they got up and they saluted. That's great."

Edward Weber, a veteran from La Porte, Ind., whose wife helps the American Legion Auxiliary, said the parade is a good patriotic exercise. "You never get a chance to salute more flags than you will in this parade," he said.

Not that the parade was only flags. There were marching bands and bands on flatbed trucks. The green-clad Oregon delegation twirled green umbrellas. Massachusetts people wearing Revolutionary War style tricorn hats marched to a band that played "God Bless America."

Among the dignitaries in the reviewing stand on 200 South, between State Street and 200 East, was Allen Dale June, a Navajo who as a young sergeant in World War II served as a member of the Marine Corps' famed "Code Talker" battalion.

Salt Lake City motorcycle officers led the six-block parade, sunlight flashing from the cycles' chrome and glass, interweaving in intricate patterns, sirens whooping and warbling.

Old convertibles wheeled past the reviewing stand carrying veterans whose service predated the cars' vintage. Crowds lining the sidewalks cheered and applauded as veterans waved and saluted.

The American Legion Riders drove their motorcycles to the convention, some starting in Indiana 1,900 miles away. The ride was a fund-raiser for the American Legacy Scholarship Fund, and an announcer said they had raised more than $100,000. Some riders sported long gray hair bound by headbands or under bandanas, while others wore their Legion hats.

Past national commanders wheeled by in horse-drawn carriages, the horses bedecked in flags and red-white-and-blue ribbons. Then came buggies with flags hanging from their flat roofs.