Rolling Thunder in Herndon
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Rolling Thunder in Herndon

Ray Delpesche, Commander of VFW Post 1177 Leesburg, Gene Odum, VFW Post 1177 Leesburg and Eli Contes, VFW Post 1177 Leesburg wait for the call, "Kickstands up," to pull out of Herndon on the Sunday before Memorial Day. Delpesche displays the MIA/POW badge on the front of his leather. Asked what Memorial Day means to him, Delpesche requoted Robert O'Neill, ex-Navy Seal known as "the man who killed Osama bin Laden” and recited, “Memorial Day is time for reflection, pause and remembrance and thanksgiving for patriots who gave up their own lives to protect the lives and freedom of us all."

Ray Delpesche, Commander of VFW Post 1177 Leesburg, Gene Odum, VFW Post 1177 Leesburg and Eli Contes, VFW Post 1177 Leesburg wait for the call, "Kickstands up," to pull out of Herndon on the Sunday before Memorial Day. Delpesche displays the MIA/POW badge on the front of his leather. Asked what Memorial Day means to him, Delpesche requoted Robert O'Neill, ex-Navy Seal known as "the man who killed Osama bin Laden” and recited, “Memorial Day is time for reflection, pause and remembrance and thanksgiving for patriots who gave up their own lives to protect the lives and freedom of us all." Photo by Mercia Hobson.

Wednesday, May 30, 2018

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Photo by Mercia Hobson

Hundreds of bikers, many military veterans, line up in front of Jimmy’s Old Town in Herndon early Sunday morning, May 27, 2018, of Memorial Day weekend. Jimmy's Old Town Tavern (JOTT), owned by Jimmy Cirrito, hosts the Tavern's Memorial Day Weekend Bash with their own Rolling Thunder Ride into the District of Columbia, one day before the official 31st annual Rolling Thunder Ride on Monday, Memorial Day. Earlier that morning before the ride, JOTT hosted members of the Save the Sheepdog Foundation, a nonprofit organization founded in Reston, created to fund research for suicide prevention for vets and first responders. Organizers told the gathered crowd at JOTT that statistics show that every day, twenty veterans and ten first responders are killing themselves. For every one suicide, there are another 25 attempts. Their newly founded foundation, Save the Sheepdog, is the first of its kind dedicated to suicide prevention for veterans and first responders through funding research and therapy. To learn more or to donate, visit Facebook Save the Sheepdog Foundation.

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Photo by Mercia Hobson

Over the Memorial Day weekend in 2018, on Sunday, May 27, the POW/MIA flag flies in front of the Town Hall in Herndon. Congress passed a public law in 1990 designating the POW/MIA flag: "The symbol of our Nation’s concern and commitment to resolving as fully as possible the fates of Americans still prisoner, missing and unaccounted for in Southeast Asia." As hundreds of motorcyclists and military veterans rolled out of Herndon Sunday, nearly all part of Rolling Thunder that would ride into the District of Columbia the next day for the 31st annual Rolling Thunder Ride for Freedom, many wore POW/MIA patches on their leather. Earlier many veterans present at the JOTT Memorial Day Bash, shared that for them they remember not only veterans killed in service, those still missing and not accounted for, but also the challenges facing veterans today, especially the high rate of suicides.

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Photo by Mercia Hobson

Four members of the Herndon and Fairfax County Police Department Motorcycle Squads escort motorcyclists, many from Rolling Thunder, from Jimmy's Old Town Tavern on the morning of Sunday, May 27, 2018. After the escort released them, the JOTT motorcyclists rode to Bolivar Park in Northwest D.C. and later stopped at the Masonic Temple for their Annual Group Photo.