[Vision2020] Giving their backs to the community

[Tom Hansen]

Congratulations on a job well done goes out to the Marines of the Palouse.

Courtesy of today's (April 22, 2013) Moscow-Pullman Daily News.

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Giving their backs to the community
By Meredith Metsker, Daily News staff writer 
It was no lazy Sunday afternoon for the Marines of the Palouse who collected and marched about 300 pounds of nonperishable food items from Moscow to Pullman on Sunday.
About 35 men and women, all current or retired Marines, picked up the food items from CD's Smoke Pit and Moscow Brewing Company in Moscow around 10 a.m. Some Marines brought along family members.
They packed canned green beans and Capri Sun drinks and dozens of other foodstuffs into backpacks, and marched the items eight miles down the Bill Chipman Palouse Trail before dropping them off at Birch and Barley in Pullman to be distributed to local food banks.
"We felt we needed to earn it for the community, so we loaded it up into our packs," said Sgt. Jefferson Griffeath, a member of Marines of the Palouse. "And a lot of these guys are veterans and we do these things called humps, which are just forced marches, and just load your packs up and start walking."
Griffeath said he carried about 70 pounds of food on his back as a way to enjoy the camaraderie that comes with being around other Marines.
"It's a sense of community," Griffeath said. "The Marine Corps it's an entirely separate culture from the rest of the United States, and a lot of these guys come back and feel like they're out of their element. They're out of their culture and this gives us the opportunity to get together."
The Marines of the Palouse was founded as a local nonprofit group about two years ago. Cpl. Ted Owens, now treasurer, was one of the founding members.
Owens said the hump was a way to show the community what the local group of Marines is willing to do to help.
"We want to give back to the community any way we can," Owens said. "We could have just drove down and dropped the food off at the food banks, but we thought this would be more meaningful and more traditionally the way Marines do it."
Owens was joined in the march by his three children Maggie, 8, Bia, 12, and Luke, 14. He said his children packed up small backpacks of their own and walked alongside the Marines for the eight-mile trek.
"They kind of wanted to," Owens said. "I didn't even ask them to do it."
Owens said another Marine brought a smaller backpack that couldn't fit as much food in it. Wanting to carry more, the Marine duct-taped cans of vegetables to his lower back.
Griffeath said Sunday's march was also special because it was the first hump he had ever gotten to go on with his younger brother, Brian, who is also a sergeant in the Marine Corps.
The brothers were both in active service around the same time, but had never been on a forced march together.
Linda Nickels, director of the Moscow Food Bank, said she was happy with the amount of food the Marines were able to raise and transport.
"It was just a really neat idea, what they were doing, especially as they got up and worked for it to get it here," Nickels said. "I was impressed. I thought that was really nice."
Birch and Barley hosted a Kegs for a Cause event from 1-4 p.m. Sunday, donating $1 for every beer purchased to the Marines of the Palouse. The restaurant raised $65.f
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Former Sgt. Shawn Lamebull, center, marches backward while checking to ensure everyone was with the main group during a Marines of the Palouse food donation drive walk moving donated food from Moscow to Pullman along the Bill Chipman Palouse Trail on Sunday. Lamebull served in the Marines from 1995-99.

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A dog leads the Marines of the Palouse food donation hike from Moscow to Pullman via the Bill Chipman Palouse Trail on Sunday, April 21, 2013.


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Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

 
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