Union Pacific honors employees serving overseas
(The following article by Diane Wetzel was posted on the North Platte Telegraph website on May 30.)
NORTH PLATTE, Neb. – When Andrew Tennessen speaks of his time in Iraq, he says simply, “It was a rough place.”
Tennessen, a strapping, genial fellow, was stationed in Muhmadia, one-third of the so-called “Triangle of Death,” with the 2nd Battery 24th Marines. He was a senior chief hospital corpsman.
Today, he is a management trainer operator for the Union Pacific Railroad, in Mankato, Minn.
"The Iraqi people there called us the “mad ghosts,” Tennessen said. His unit had T-shirts designed with a graphic of a ghost. Tennessen brought a pile of the shirts with him to North Platte this weekend from his home in Minnesota.
Tennessen made the 11-hour drive to participate in the third year of a program that takes place on Memorial Day at the Union Pacific’s Bailey Yard. Volunteers raise and lower American flags - one for every U.P. employee currently serving in the military overseas. The flags fly over the yard for a minimum of one minute, before being folded, tagged, then shipped to the serviceman or woman or their family members.
The idea of honoring those in the service on Memorial Day began when the U.P.'s public relations office asked Bruce Ferguson to come up with an idea to show support for employees who have been called up for service.
Now living in Omaha, Ferguson tended the American flags flying at Bailey Yard while he worked in North Platte. He and his wife Debbie were back in North Platte for the Memorial Day ceremony.
“We will send a flag to every mobilized reservist,” Ferguson said.
U.P. machinist and retired Marine Darren Deppen also volunteered his time to the project.
“Bruce decided after 9/11 he wanted to do something for active-duty members,” Deppen said. "Our local director, David Thalken, allowed the p
