Day thirty seven - Tuesday

When we left Gettysburg, we planned to have a travel day with no sight seeing. However, as we travelled through western Maryland we realized we were going to be in the area of the National Firefighters Memorial in Emmitsburg Maryland. We pulled off the highway and into the National Emergency Training Center. When we stopped at the security building we were met by security personnel who escourted us to a parking lot where the motor home could be parked. After a short walk we found ourselves at the memorial.

This memorial was built in 1981 and has a brass plaque for each year since. There is one plaque just for Sept. 11, 2001. Each plaque lists, by state, fire personnel who died in the line of duty. The president was here last week.

The flags were at half-mast due to two recent deaths. One, a ninteen-year old volunteer was killed when a building collapsed on him during mop-up. The other, a twenty-four year old volunteer died when he crashed his own vehicle while responding to a call. I just read that a fire fighter died in Big Sur California while fighting a fire there. That'll be another name to add to the list.

After visiting the memorial, we continued to our final destination of the day, Harrisonburg, Virginia. We'll spend the night in the Wal-Mart parking lot.