Letters from home

Fulton elementary school students launch letter-writing campaign for USS Truman sailors

Students around Fulton have joined McIntire Elementary in their letter writing campaign to the USS Truman. The school currently has just under 1,000 letters, but their goal is 6,000 so that every sailor on-board the carrier receives one.
Students around Fulton have joined McIntire Elementary in their letter writing campaign to the USS Truman. The school currently has just under 1,000 letters, but their goal is 6,000 so that every sailor on-board the carrier receives one.

Sailors on the aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman will be feeling a little love from home when they receive thousands of letters from their supporters here in Fulton.

McIntire Elementary students are once again inviting the community to write letters to crewmembers of the USS Truman - whom they have officially adopted - this time hoping to double the number of letters they received when they took on the challenge four years ago.

"We got 3,000 letters that time," said Cami Webb, who teaches at McIntire and spearheaded the campaign. "This time, we need 6,000. I would love for every sailor there to have a letter of support from Fulton."

Webb has a close family friend who is deployed on the Truman. She also knows Savannah Maddison, a musician who has a nationwide program entitled, Savannah's Soldiers. Those two elements together helped her decide to shoulder the task of inspiring the community to write. She also has family members in the military, so she knows how important it is for personnel to feel love from home.

"We have seen the letters have a tremendous impact on the morale of our sailors," Cmdr. Brian Waite, Command Religious Ministries Head of Department for the Truman, wrote in an email. "As the letters are passed throughout the ship, sailors' faces light up as they read the notes from home; oftentimes reading out loud to each other the letters from children."

Waite also said that the letters are a tangible piece of home.

"These letters are more than just a note," he wrote. "They are a true sign of the gratitude of a grateful nation."

Webb said that many other schools in the area are also joining the campaign, including Kingdom Christian Academy, Bartley Elementary, Fulton Education Center and St. Peter Catholic School.

"We eventually want to build a lesson around this," said Webb, who plans to bring together a panel of "community heroes" to teach the children a bit about their own wars. She hopes this will tie together with the experiences the children are learning now through their letter writing.

The kids are interested in and curious about the sailors they are writing to. Letters ask if sailors get sea-sick, how they steer their "boat' and what they do for fun. They also share their own lives, telling those they are writing to about family members who have been in the military.

"My grandpa and uncles were in the Army," wrote one young person.

"I got a letter from a grandma in Kansas City," said Webb. "Her grandson had called her and told her about writing letters and asked her to write."

Many of the students tell the sailors "thank you,' and others send their prayers. One writer told her recipient, "We'll get through this together."

At least one of those recipients is going to know a bit about the Missourians who are writing because he was born and raised here.

"As a resident of Missouri, I can tell you there is something special about receiving a letter from an elementary school child," wrote Lt.j.g. Kent Roseman, assistant first lieutenant, who was born in Springfield, but lived in Greenfield until he was 18. "It lets us, as sailors, understand we are not forgotten."

The students may have the opportunity to Skype with the sailors on-board the carrier. The activity was originally planned for Friday, but for security reasons officials have, at the time of this writing, cut off communications. It is possible, depending on circumstances, that it may come together at the last minute.

Even if students don't get to talk to the sailors "face to face," they can take heart from fellow Missourian Roseman.

"I would like to say to all the wonderful students at McIntire Elementary School that we appreciate them taking time out of their day to remember what we are doing out here. It makes us happy and allows us to remember what is was like when we were children doing the same for the past conflicts of our nation," Roseman said.

Community members who want to take part may send their letters in care of Cami Webb at McIntire Elementary, 706 Hickman Avenue.