PEKIN, Ill. – For the past four months, students at Pekin Community High School spent time with veterans in Tazewell County to learn about their stories and share their wisdom.
“Honoring the Veterans of Tazewell County” was revealed Wednesday at the high school. The project involved around 15 students who talked to veterans about the words of Courage, Honor, Duty, and Patriotism. Photos of the veterans were also taken.
County Clerk John Ackerman says he went back to the students at Pekin to try another project, after the success last year of researching Nance Legins-Costley. The discussions started with the Civil War veterans who won Medals of Honor, and grew from there.
Junior Harley Tovrea led the project, which ended up interviewing around 25 veterans.
“It kinda was an intense process trying to get all these veterans in and get their interviews, but it paid off in the end,” Tovrea said.
Tovrea says some of the veterans were teachers at the high school, while letters were sent to other veterans to request interviews with them.
He says the biggest takeaway from the interviews was seeing improvements in honoring veterans returning home, and a lesson of learning from the past.
Portions of the interviews were compiled on a website, featuring quotes from the veterans about each of the four pillars discussed. An American flag was also made, using the hands of the veterans interviewed, along with portraits of them and the three Medal of Honor recipients from Tazewell County.
One of the veterans interviewed was East Peoria Mayor John Kahl. Kahl served as a Marine, and his sister, Colleen, was the social studies teacher who led the students on the project.
He called the experience “humbling.”
“It was truly an honor as a combat veteran to take part in this project, and surround myself with veterans from other conflicts,” Kahl said. “It was an amazing day. The students were absolutely phenomenal. Sitting down for their interviews, you can tell that they truly had a passion for this project.”
Colleen Kahl says while the website is up, the project is not quite finished.
“We created a Google form where anyone who has a veteran in Tazewell County can fill out this form. They could give a quote on any of the four pillars, they can give advice, they can upload a picture, they can give us their bios, so that this continues to be an on-going website,” Colleen Kahl siad.
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