Local veterans group celebrates 78 years of Seabees

The Seabees don’t look a day over 78.

On March 7, a local chapter of the Seabee veterans group will be celebrating the special unit’s 78th anniversary with a birthday celebration at the Missouri’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Perryville. The ceremony will honor some 75 local veterans who served in the Construction Battalion — nicknamed Seabees — and will also include a chapter meeting prior to the celebration.

A hybrid of the Navy and Marine branches of the military, the Seabees are the naval Construction Battalion that has been involved in World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam War, the Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Vice commander of the local Island 5 veterans chapter Thomas Meyer said the regional group first formed nearly a decade ago when a few veterans from this military battalion noticed the national Construction Battalion veteran group.

From there, a call was sent out to judge the need for a local Seabees group; Meyer said that call located Seabee veterans from all over Missouri and into Illinois.

“It’s a good camaraderie,” Meyer said of the formation of the local group. “We found that there’s a lot of Seabees locally that we didn’t know.”

During the “Bee’s Swarm” meeting prior to the celebration, the names of 85 Vietnam Seabees veterans, inscribed on the memorial wall, will be read. The meeting will also discuss plans for the group’s June meeting and a granite memorial wall. Seabees veterans in attendance will be asked to share their names and a few details about their service. Meyer said he was a builder second class veteran with Battalion 62 during the Vietnam War.

After that? Cake, coffee and doughnuts, to celebrate 78 years since the special unit’s founding in 1942.

While units of the Seabees are still active in California and Mississippi; Meyer said the group isn’t as active as it previously was. Meyer said the nature of the Seabees, however, means when the need for a larger Construction Battalion arises, they would always be up for the challenge.

“Our motto, ‘Can Do,’ means that there aren’t any undertakings we can’t accomplish,” he said.

the anniversary celebration will be held from 9 a.m. to noon March 7 at Missouri’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial, 1172 Veteran Memorial Parkway in Perryville.

For more information, call Thomas Meyer at (573) 270-4499 or email tmmeyer@tlmrealty.com.