Troy offers multiple events to remember the fallen on Memorial Day

TROY — Memorial Day is coming up on Monday, May 29, and Troy is offering residents several opportunities to join in and give their respect to the United States’ fallen veterans.

Both the city of Troy and White Chapel Memorial Park Cemetery will host programs for the holiday.

Troy will host its annual Memorial Day Ceremony at 10 a.m. Monday, May 29, at Veterans Memorial Plaza in front of Troy City Hall, located at 500 W. Big Beaver Road.

“It’s a ceremony to honor Memorial Day, which is a federal holiday to celebrate those who died serving in our armed forces,” explained Cindy Stewart, Troy’s community affairs director. “The city of Troy has conducted a Memorial Day ceremony for many years to do just that in our Memorial Plaza. We have a keynote speaker. We have the Troy Heritage Concert Band, and the Troy Police Honor Guard will raise and lower the flag, and we lay a wreath by our veterans monument. … We feel very strongly about recognizing those who served. Many city employees in Troy are veterans.”

The keynote speaker for this year’s event at City Hall comes from Selfridge Air National Guard Base.

“Our special guest is Master Sgt. Matthew McCroskery, who is with the U.S. Air Force and works over at Selfridge,” said Stewart. She said the commanders at Selfridge selected McCroskery to speak. “He has been in the Air Force for 22 years,” he said. “He’s very accomplished.”

McCroskery enlisted in the Air Force Reserves in 2001 and took part in Operation: Enduring Freedom and Operation: Iraqi Freedom, serving overseas in both Iraq and Uzbekistan. Now stationed at Selfridge as a first sergeant, he maintains discipline, standards, and the health and welfare of enlisted personnel; ensures discipline is fair and equitable; and counsels and provides assistance as needed. He advises the commander on performance reports, awards and promotions, and manages the recognition program.

The first of two free events being hosted by White Chapel Memorial Park Cemetery, located at 621 W. Long Lake Road in Troy, will be a concert at 3 p.m. Sunday, May 28. The performance will take place in front of the cemetery’s Temple of Memories.

“We’ve been holding the Sunday concert for more than 25 years. The Memorial Day service has been going on since 1930,” said David Krall, the vice president of White Chapel Memorial Park Cemetery. “The concert is free and will take place at 3 p.m. and features the Birmingham Concert Band. They will be playing a number of patriotic and big-band era songs. We draw a few hundred people each year for that event.”

He added that the concert is an enjoyable but respectful way to recognize the legacy of fallen veterans.

“The concert is another opportunity to remember what this day is all about,” said Krall. “It lets us honor our veterans both alive and those who have passed. We have people who come every year. The Birmingham Concert Band always does a great job and is excellent at what they do.”

The second event will take place at 11 a.m. on Monday, May 29, also on the grounds of the cemetery. It will be the 92nd annual remembrance of the Polar Bear expedition in 1918, a unit significantly composed of Michigan residents.

“The Polar Bear soldiers went over to Russia to fight the Russian Bolsheviks and get them to come back into the war, fighting Germany,” said Krall. “The war ended on Nov. 11, in 1918, but they were still fighting because they were trapped until the early summer of 1919. Ten years later, a delegation from the (Veterans of Foreign Wars) and a bunch of the Polar Bears went over there in 1929, went back to recover their fellow brothers who died in action or died from the Spanish Flu. They brought 41 back to lay in state in our mausoleum until they dedicated the Polar Bear monument here later that year. Other than the two years of COVID, we’ve had this memorial each year at White Chapel Cemetery.”

He said that he hopes the public will do their part in keeping alive the memory of those who fell in combat, even in conflicts that concluded before most people alive now were born.

“This will be a chance to honor all the fallen in all of our conflicts,” said Krall. “We have a World War II memorial, Korean War memorial, Vietnam War memorial, a War on Terror memorial, a Gulf War memorial and POW/MIA memorial.”

Both Stewart and Krall said they hope the public will keep the reason for the holiday in their minds.

“A lot of people think of Memorial Day as the start of summer and the beginning of going outside and taking vacations, but we hope they also will take some time that day to remember those who died in service to our country,” Stewart remarked.

“We believe that it is the responsibility of our present generation to remember and honor the service and sacrifice of our fallen service members,” added Krall. “We would not have our freedoms if not for them. Memorial Day is not just for vacations and barbecues. It’s for remembering.”