Thursday, September 24, 2015

American Pride: Veteran shares special flag with Bearcat football

 (Note: This story appeared in the Sept. 23 edition of The Anderson News. I have copied here to share with a wider audience.)


Is this the first time you've been to our little town?
...I don't like to brag but we're kinda proud of that Ragged Old Flag.”
--Johnny Cash

The flag the Anderson County football team rallies around is not yet ragged. It might never be tattered or threadbare.
But the same message it waved in the winds near one of the world's hot spots is the one the Bearcats want to shout every time they take the field for the battle of a football game.
The Anderson County Bearcats take the field with the American Flag.
It's all about patriotism. It is about the freedom to play a game. It's about the sacrifice and cohesion needed for success in something as little as a football game or in fighting for the freedom that flag represents.
Anderson County is a place where people like to wave the red, white and blue. Just sit along one of the main highways that mark the county and chances are it won't be long until you see the Stars and Stripes flying from the back end of a pickup.
It's just who Anderson County is.
Just as Kirby Alexander's flag being carried by one of the Bearcats for Friday Night Lights is now part of the fabric of the community.


Service was 'something to do'
An Army veteran, Kirby Alexander was just trying to become a part of his new community when he started attending high school football games six years ago.
He'd been a pretty good player at Montgomery County High School in the early 1970s, but joined the Army after graduation. He saw much of the world before leaving the service and eventually coming to Lawrenceburg.
I just started going to the (Anderson County) football games,” Alexander says.
He became a regular, regardless of the location.
I first met Kirby at Marion County,” remembers Steve Carmichael, who had two sons line up as quarterback and lead the Bearcats to district and regional championships. “I thought he was a bus driver, but he was at the game and we just started talking.
I tell him I thought he looked like he was part of the Duck Dynasty crew.”
It was in 2008, not long after Kirby started calling Anderson County home.
Instead, Kirby became part of the field painting crew charged with getting Bearcats' home turf ready for Friday nights. “He was very dependable,” remembers Carmichael, who was also on the crew.
I just enjoy it. It gives me something to do,” says Alexander, now 58 and retired.
Little did anyone know the guy who just showed up at games because he wanted to be a part of his new community would grow into a fixture.

Band of Brothers carry flag to battle
About the same time, Anderson football coach Mark Peach, an avowed history buff, had been reading Stephen Ambrose's classic, “Band of Brothers.” Fascinated with the incredible stories of Easy Company of the 101st Airborne in World War II, Peach believed he could apply some of those lessons to the football field and teach his team about sacrifice and service in the real world at the same time.
The Anderson County team gathers under the flag before a game.
The kids started talking about wanting something to carry into battle,” Alexander says. “I started thinking this flag might be the best thing they can carry. The players are very patriotic and want to thank the veterans for serving every day.”
This flag” is not just any red, white and blue fabric, though.
Alexander, at one time a paratrooper, was assigned to the 2nd Infantry Division at Camp Casey, South Korea, located near the Demilitarized Zone. The base is manned to deter aggression from North Korea and to provide defense, if necessary.
When he returned to the United States, Alexander brought a flag home with him.
That same flag which flew in sight of Kim Jong-il's Communist regime would teach some lasting lessons.
I put the flag on a 10-foot pole and drove up there,” he says of a trip to the 2011 regional championship game at Conner High School. “Nobody knew what I was going to do. … I told Coach Peach and he said, 'Let's go ask the kids. I have no problem.'”


Not a good luck charm
It would be wrong to think that the Anderson football team sees the flag as a good luck charm. Nor is the Band of Brothers military theme a careless use of military terminology to get high school athletes to play a game with raw emotion.
What Kirby's flag represents is much, much deeper and meaningful.
You have to be chosen by the rest of the team to carry it,” says current Anderson senior Nathan McGregor, one of the team captains. “It is an honor.”
Carmichael, an Air Force veteran, liked what he saw in the Band of Brothers theme and what Alexander's flag had made it hit close to home.
The kids had bought into the Band of Brothers theme,” he says. “They gained an appreciation for people who serve and the representation of that flag and the freedoms we have because of that flag. It means something for these kids to be able to take it on the field.”
Peach has used the Band of Brothers theme to talk about sacrifice and teamwork, but is quick to remind any who listen that a game is nothing compared to war.
It's not even close,” says Peach. “But we can honor people who have served when we do sacrifice.”

Getting the message right
Alexander says his adopted hometown and team are getting it right.
A lot of people don't really understand what a soldier has to do,” he says. “No soldier can do it alone. You have to have a team. You have to have cohesion, leadership, dedication and sacrifice. And you have to use your intelligence to get things done.
I have no problem with (using the military theme). I wish more schools would take the concept.”
Over the years, the Bearcats have become more than a football team as they engage in various community service projects such as Challenger League baseball for special needs children and cleaning up around The Healing Field, a collection of flags remembering every Kentuckian killed in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Alexander says he salutes the field every time he drives past it on Broadway in Lawrenceburg.
Over the past five or six years, I have seen the football team with very much integrity,” Alexander says. “I can't explain the word for it. I see them go to The Healing Field at the Legion, clean it up and not say a word.
Younger children want to help Kirby Alexander with his flag.
I have seen two of the boys in Alton Station drive by in a pickup truck. They didn't know I was behind them. They stopped and helped a lady who was mowing her yard with a push mower. They ended up mowing the yard for her. They got in their truck and drove off without taking any money.”
And sometimes that service goes beyond doing something in the community.
Several players have chosen some form of military service when they finish high school. “I had nothing to do with their decisions,” Alexander says, “but I think the military is a good career.”
The Anderson County flag tradition was borne on a cold November night at Conner High School. The Bearcats drove for the winning touchdown with 44 seconds to play.
The young man who caught Seth Carmichael's fourth-down pass, Matt Sprague, had already decided what he wanted to do with his life.
He'll graduate from the United States Air Force Academy next spring.

So we raise her up every morning, we take her down every night.
We don't let her touch the ground and we fold her up right.
On second thought, I'd like to brag
'Cause I'm mighty proud of the Ragged Old Flag.
--Johnny Cash

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