Uss Cole

Memorial signs honoring Washington County's two veterans killed on the USS Cole in October 2000 will be erected Saturday by the Joint Veterans Council in each of the young men's hometowns.At 9 a.m., a sign honoring Fireman Patrick Roy, U.S. Navy, will be placed at the intersection of Main Street and Dog Street Road in Keedysville. The second memorial sign will go up at 10 a.m. at the corner of Salisbury and Conococheague streets in Williamsport to honor Seaman Craig Wibberley, U.S. Navy.

pepperb@herald-mail.com SHARPSBURG - Three years have passed since the USS Cole was attacked, but Patrick H. Roy has not been forgotten. Amid a sea of gray square headstones at Antietam National Cemetery - marking the heroism of soldiers from as far back as the Civil War to as recently as the Korean War - Roy is buried, a stark white monument to the 17 sailors killed in a terrorist attack on Oct. 12, 2000, as they stopped to refuel their ship in Aden, Yemen. In separate ceremonies Sunday about 30 war veterans honored two of the attack's victims: Keedysville native Roy, who was a fireman aboard the USS Cole, and Williamsport native Craig B. Wibberley, who served as one of the ship's seamen.

chambersburg@herald-mail.com Intricately stitched by the hands of more than 1,000 people, the human toll of three decades of terrorism has been writ large upon a huge American flag conceived by a U.S. Navy wife from Chambersburg. Elizabeth Barnes of Norfolk, Va., came up with the idea for the Memorial Flag Project after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that killed approximately 3,000 people at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and on a flight that passengers wrested from the terrorists over a field in Shanksville, Pa. This Fourth of July, from 12:30 to 7:30 p.m., the flag will be at Shippensburg Memorial Park, weather permitting.

katec@herald-mail.com Laurence Sharpe, 81, was a college student in Michigan when he heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. He remembers it well. He also recalls exactly where he was when he learned of John F. Kennedy's assassination on Nov. 22, 1963. An editor in the press service of the United States Information Agency in Washington, D.C., he was just going out for lunch. The bells on the United Press International teletype machines began ringing.

marlob@herald-mail.com A memorial plaque was dedicated at Fountain Rock Elementary School on Thursday night to U.S. Navy Seaman Craig Wibberley, who was killed two years ago in the terrorist attack on the USS Cole. "Craig's life was lost in his devotion to duty, to God and to country," said the Rev. Anne Weatherholt during a ceremony at the school where Wibberley was a student from 1986 to 1991. "He has become a hero to all of us. " Weatherholt said she hopes the plaque will inspire pride in every student who sees it. The plaque was unveiled by Wibberley's parents, Thomas and Patty Wibberley.

martinsburg@herald-mail.com A light, nearly indiscernible rain fell Saturday morning as family and honor guard members gathered to remember Patrick Howard Roy, who was killed two years ago aboard the USS Cole. Roy was 19 years old. Roy's father, Michael Roy, called the day one of "contrast. " As he mourned the loss of one of his sons, American families could be on the verge of seeing their sons and daughters sent to war, he said. "I'm real concerned, I'm real worried," he said.

laurae@herald-mail.com Despite being critically burned in a cooking accident at Washington County Technical High School last month, culinary student Dustin Holley graduated with his class Tuesday. "I was a little reluctant at first. People talked me into it. I know all my friends are behind me," said Holley, who had bandages around the burns on his neck. Holley's face, chest and arms were burned May 9 while he and two other students were preparing a chicken flamb dish.

waynesboro@herald-mail.com SHARPSBURG - Gavin Williams sat on a bench in front of Sharpsburg Town Hall Saturday morning waiting for the Memorial Day celebrations to start. "They really got the spirit that all the towns used to have," he said. The spirit Williams spoke of was the true meaning of Memorial Day - remembering those who died in the nation's service. "The parking lot at Wal-Mart will be jammed this morning, but people can't take the time to come to something like this," said Williams, 77, an Army veteran from Charles Town, W.Va.

Hundreds of pages of memos, reports, interviews and diagrams that were part of the government investigation into the October 2000 terrorist attack on the USS Cole can now be found at the Washington County Free Library. Williamsport resident Thomas Wibberley, whose son Craig was one of the 17 sailors killed in the attack, recently donated his copy of the report to the library. "I just figured that with the whole incident, and Craig being from this area, (the library) would be a good place for them instead of me just putting them in the attic," Wibberley said.

USS Cole sailors honored ANNAPOLIS - The Maryland Senate passed a resolution this week recognizing and memorializing the deaths of 17 Americans in the Oct. 12 bombing of the USS Cole. Sen. Don Munson spoke to the Senate Tuesday about the loss of two Washington County seamen in the tragedy in Yemen. "On that day occurred an event so loathsome, so cowardly, so awful and so sad that the world will not soon forget it and Washington County will never forget it," said Munson, R-Washington.