Maryville American Legion Post #917 To Dissolve After 75 Years

By Charlie Feldman

cfeldman@timestribunenews.com

Maryville American Legion Post #917 is calling it quits.

The announcement was made by post commander Larry Gulledge at the Wednesday, August 18 village board meeting.

He came to present a $51,200 check to be used for a new bandstand to be placed in Fireman’s Park for the village’s Concert in the Park series and the bands that play at Homecoming and other events.

“We just want everybody to know that this is our seventy-fifth year,” said Gulledge, the post’s youngest member. “Because of COVID, and all of us guys are getting a lot older, we just can’t seem to make it work anymore. So we’re going to be contacting the district office and closing our post here in Maryville.

“But we wanted to come tonight,” he said. “We’d like to make a presentation to the mayor and to the village and to thank you guys for the many years that the village has worked with the American Legion. We worked so many years down at the park with the wheel and helping in the food stand and you guys would help us. It was just a great partnership that we had with the village. So this is what the membership wanted to do.”

The post started in 1946, right after the second World War. It was named after Julius Zupan, “the first Maryville resident killed in the war,” Gulledge said.

“We have been wanting to put a bandstand in Fireman’s Park for years,” said Mayor Craig Short.

“The only thing that they have asked is something that will benefit the fire department, the Homecoming Association with their longtime association, benefit the village and will have a plaque commemorating the American Legion post,” he said.

“This isn’t anything that’s just going to sit,” Short said. “They’re not getting any younger. We’re going to move a little bit on this.”