FAYETTEVILLE - Friends and family of late Army veteran Bo Swearingen gathered on a chilly morning Saturday in the dimly lit, old Coors warehouse at 700 S. Hill St. to carry on his wish of raising money to buy more land for the Fayetteville National Cemetery.
The group, which also included several work-release prisoners from the Washington County jail, began the two-day task of disassembling 5,000 Christmas wreaths that adorned the graves at the cemetery last year. The wire bases will be sold to the Fayetteville Recycling Center, and the various other components will be donated to nonprofit organizations.
Swearingen - who was buried in the cemetery after he and his wife, Lori Swearingen, were killed April 3, 2010, in a traffic accident caused by a drunken driver - was passionate about raising funds to expand the cemetery.
On Saturday, the helpers stood or sat in rings around large stacks of wreaths. The smell of pine was heavy in the air as they pulled the evergreen branches from the thick metal wiring. They detached the red ribbons and placed them into large plastic bags before they gathered up the white tags attached to the wreaths.
It was slow-going to take apart the thousands of stoutly assembled wreaths that were donated by Wreaths Across America, which supplies wreaths for national cemeteries across the country.
Saturday’s volunteers said they liked that they were giving something to the community and that recycling the wreaths would help veterans as well as the national cemetery.
“Because of his earthly death, look at all these people working together,” Swearingen’s mother, Jannie Bibb, said as she looked at the activity around her.
Bibb said she and her late husband, David Bibb, founded Bo’s Blessings, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping veterans, as was her son’s wish.
Bo’s Blessings sponsored the weekend’s wreath-recycling event, and workers from Fayetteville, the Washington County sheriff’s office, Springdale Christian Church and the Boy Scouts participated, as well as several individuals, Bibb said.
The money raised will be donated to the Regional National Cemetery Improvement Corp. - a local group that is buying surrounding land to expand the Fayetteville cemetery and to help keep it operating. President Ron Butler said the group recently turned over 2.3 acres it purchased to the U.S. Veterans Affairs Department for the cemetery and is working to purchase another 1.95 acres.
This is the second year for the wreath-recycling project. Last year, Bibb said, Bo’s Blessings and the Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association donated $500 to the corporation for the cemetery land purchase program.
“You have to be thankful for a bunch of folks like that,” Butler said of the wreath recyclers. “It’s nothing they have to do but want to do.”
Nothing from the wreaths will go to waste. Bibb said the city has donated large roll-off containers to hold stacks of pine stems, which will be composted.
The red ribbons from the wreaths will be donated to Mothers Against Drunk Driving and will be carried in a survivors march in Little Rock later this year, she said.
And the tags will be given to the Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association AR-72, which will use them to start a bonfire at an April 12 memorial for Bo and Lori Swearingen.
Bibb said her son joined the Army in 1995 and served with the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) in Iraq, reaching the rank of sergeant first class. He earned the Bronze Star and numerous other medals during his 12 years in the service, she said.
Arkansas, Pages 13 on 02/23/2014