Newtonians honor those who died in Greensburg tornado

After a sleepless night thinking about a phone call he had received that day, Bill Ryan, owner of Those Blasted Signs in Newton, knew what he had to do to help a woman’s dream come to life.

That dream was a memorial dedicated to those who lost their lives in a tornado that leveled most of the city of Greensburg on May 4, 2007.

“We had talked for about 30 minutes about what she wanted to do,” he said. “From the sounds of it, she was going to have to get pretty resourceful to get the money.”

The next morning, Ryan called Julia Ohlde of Larned back.Ryan told her, “Don’t worry about the stone, I’ve got it covered. Just worry about where you want to put it.”

Then, Ryan got together with members of American Legion Post No. 2 to donate $100 toward the cost of the 4-feet tall by 2-feet wide gray granite stone. Then the Post challenged other chapters around the state to match that donation.

With the ball rolling, Ryan got to work etching the memorial stone. He had less than a month to get the stone finished and in place before a dedication ceremony on the one-year anniversary of the natural disaster in the rural Kansas community.

On Friday, May 2, Ryan traveled to Greensburg to put the stone in place and meet Ohlde for the first time in person.

“When our vehicles pulled up in front of the place where we were going to set the stone and we got out, we immediately knew who the other was,” Ryan said. “It was pretty cool.”

On the one-year anniversary of the tornado, members of the Kansas Patriot Guard, made up of members of the Kansas American Legion Riders from across the state, traveled to Greensburg to honor those who survived and remember those who lost their lives in the tragic event.

Members of the local American Legion Post and others from the area met in Pratt before heading into Greensburg together.

Ryan said about 400 riders who met in the Wal-Mart parking lot in Pratt.

“It was a pretty cool sight to see all those bikes,” he said.

But, that wasn’t even half of who showed up in Greensburg. Ryan said total there probably were more than 1,500 bikes.

For the dedication ceremony, which took place before President Bush arrived in the rural Kansas community, members of the Newton American Legion formed a semi-circle folding 10-foot flags around the stage constructed on the lot where Ohlde’s grandfather had lived and perished.

“All the family members that were there seemed very grateful,” Ryan said. “That made it all worthwhile.”

Not only did the American Legion raise funds to pay for the memorial stone, but Ryan was able to surprise Ohlde with a check for $1,000 to start an endowment to help with maintaining the memorial and the land around it.

“The support received from the posts was just outrageous,” he said. “I couldn’t be more proud to be a member of the Legion and the Legion Riders than I am after this.”