Saratoga News

The Foothill Club continues its Memorial Day tradition

By John Pancharian

The somber voice of trumpets playing "Taps," answering each other from across Madronia Cemetery, will punctuate Memorial Day services planned by the Saratoga Foothill Club. The ceremony begins at 9:30 a.m., May 25, at the Memorial Arch Plaza with the laying of a wreath, then continues with a march to Madronia Cemetery.

The Saratoga High School band and the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 344 Color Guard will lead the march, which drew more than 100 participants last year. Highlights of the services include an address by Saratoga Mayor Don Wolfe. Boy Scout Troop 535 will present the colors, and the SHS band will play "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "America the Beautiful."

"I've gone for years," Marilyn White, Foothill Club member and Memorial Day ceremony chairwoman, said. "This is something every year that a lot of people look forward to."

This year they can look forward to a speech titled "Veterans Who Bought Freedom for the World," by keynote speaker and World War II veteran Wilbur Pecka. Pecka was a first lieutenant in the U.S. Army Air Corps who served as navigator on a B-24 bomber conducting air raids over Germany. His plane crashed in Holland in 1943, and Pecka spent a year and a half as a prisoner of war in northern Germany.

The annual Memorial Day observance in Saratoga was begun in the 1920s by the few ranchers and townspeople who lived near the village. In 1928 the Foothill Club, a women's service club, began coordinating the event. More than 200 people are expected to attend the ceremony this year.

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