Field of Honor marks another year

Flags fill Pearson Park to honor local heros

BY SCOTT TAYLOR STAYLOR@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Judy Ceretto and her husband Ron, a retired Fort Lupton re ghter, were traveling through Nevada when they happened upon a sea of American ags.

“We had been out there for a week and we went by when they were just putting the ags out,” Ceretto said. “We didn’t get to see any of the events but just the ags, and we stopped and looked at it. I thought, ‘Wow. We need to bring it back home.’” e patriotic display was her rst encounter with Fields of Honor, part of a national e ort to help communities celebrate their local heroes — veterans and police, re and emergency medical rst responders.

“I had to stop and go nd out who was behind it and how to go about doing it myself,” Ceretto said. “I told my husband, we are going to go home and we are going to do that in Fort Lupton.” is is the third year Ceretto and a group of local volunteers, working the Colonial Flag Foundation, have lled Fort Lupton’s Pearson Park Fields with American ags for the Great Plains Field of Honor. For 2023, the eld features 1,020 ags. More than half — 677 ags, to be exact — have been sponsored, paid for by local family and friends. ey all want to honor their family that have served publicly, as veterans and as rst responders.

“It’s the same for me now,” Ceretto said. “Each time I come up that hill and see those ags, I still bust out crying.” e eld has been open daily in the eld since, from noon to 8 p.m. Sitting in a green tent at the entrance, volunteers have a listing of every sponsored ag on display and can help people nd the ag honoring their loved ones.

It’s the third time in four year Ceretto and her friends have volunteered to make the event happen. e rst two years, in 2020 and 2021, the Fort Lupton event has held November. Two factors complicated both events, she said: e weather, with November gloom and early sunsets, and the calendar.

“We had to work around the recreation department schedule and the weather, so they decided we needed to move to April,” she said. “ ere wasn’t enough time to do it by April 2022, so we postponed it until now.” e event’s proximity to Veterans Day also made nding speakers and presenters that much more di cult, she said.

“We couldn’t get speakers, we couldn’t get yovers, we couldn’t get anything like that,” she said. “In November, they’re already spoken for. is year, we have plenty.” ere’s no lack of speakers this year at the April 29 ceremony. Featured guests include retired Larimer County Sheri Justin Smith, a yover featuring military helicopters, a 21 gun salute and a 13 folds ceremony, in which each fold of the ag represents a special meaning. ere will also be bagpipes from the Colorado Emerald Society and an honor bell. e ceremony is scheduled for 1 p.m. April 29 at the elds, northeast of the intersection of Highway 85 and Highway 52 in Fort Lupton.

But the eld of ags, the thing that caught Ceretto’s eye, are still the main draw. Volunteers opened the decorated eld on April 26, posting them in rows deep. e sponsored ags all carry memorial cards saying who is being honored, from World War I and II veterans, those from Vietnam, the Gulf War and Afghanistan to rst responders around the country with local family.

Flag sponsorships cost $25 per ag. Proceeds from those sponsorships go to Warrior NOW, an e ort to end veteran suicide, and Building Warriors. at’s a non-pro t group that seeks to provide wellness services to rst responders and their families.

People are welcome to visit the eld at anytime, and just take it all in, she said.