‘Hometown Hero’ banners come down in Medina with more to be added next year
Photos by Ginny Kropf: (Left) Scott Petry on Monday removes a flag from its hardware on Main Street. Two crews from Medina’s DPW took down all the veterans’ banners Monday. Families wishing to keep their banner which had been up for the third year can pick them up between 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. today at the village clerk’s office on Park Avenue. (Center) DPW worker Scott Petry removes a veteran’s flag on Main Street near the Medina theater. Forty new ones were added this year. (Right) These banners on West Avenue across from Lee-Whedon Memorial Library are the family of Mary Woodruff’s husband Paul. Mary hangs them every year, as Paul’s dad Willis Burr Woodruff is the reason Mary started the banner program in Medina, after seeing them in Willis’ hometown of Almond.
MEDINA – As is traditional in Medina the day after Veterans’ Day, Medina DPW was out early in the morning taking down the veterans’ banners for another year.
Mary Woodruff, who heads the banner project, will be at the Medina village clerk’s office from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. today to hand out the banners which have hung for three years and can now be claimed by family members.
Woodruff started the project in 2019 after seeing her husband Paul’s father’s banner while visiting Almond.
“The banners were first hanging on wires in a school gymnasium and they blew my mind,” she said. “I talked to the lady who did them and got the information and brought it back to Medina. Mike Sidari was mayor then and I started to explain the program at a Village Board meeting. That was November 2018 and I got the OK that night. The program took off and has grown every year since.”
The first year 30 banners were hung in 2019, and by 2021, there were more than 100, and then 240 in 2022.
“I can’t say enough about the DPW, who puts up the banners and takes them down,” Woodruff said.
Banners hang for three years, and on the third year, the first year’s banners are taken home and washed by Mary and Paul, then made available for families to pick them up.
Applications for next year’s banners will be available after the first of January. The cost is a one-time charge of $200 for three years’ exposure. A banner may be hung for a fourth year for an additional cost of $125.
Although Paul’s father was from Alfred Station south of Buffalo, Mary hangs it every year, because he is the reason she started the project in Medina. Willis Burr Woodruff was a tech sergeant with the U. S. Army during World War II.
Other relatives, which all hung together on West Avenue near the railroad tracks, were John McElwain, a brother-in-law; Ken Schaal, cousin; and Carl Caleb Jr., Mary’s brother-in-law.
Banners hung have represented veterans in all branches of the military and World War I, World War II, Korean War, Vietnam Conflict and Persian Gulf War. Woodruff is excited at the prospect next year of having at least one soldier represented from the Revolutionary War.
