Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 20, 1991 TAG: 9102200583
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-8 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium
"During the Christmas holidays, I looked at our lights and thought about how sad it was that our men in the gulf weren't here sharing in the festivities," said Anne Loflin of Virginia Beach.
She kept the candle in her window as "one small offering of love for laying their lives down for me and my family."
Throughout Hampton Roads, the candle in the window has joined putting up yellow ribbons and flying the U.S. flag as a way of showing support.
Usually, the message is one of support for the troops, but there are variations.
Robert Carey of Norfolk said his candle is "in support of President Bush . . . and our young men and women and what they are doing over there for our freedom and the democratic way."
Deanna Marroletti of Virginia Beach, a Tidewater Community College student, has two candles in the windows of her home.
"One is for all the troops," she said, especially for "one of the guys in my chemistry class" who is in the Middle East.
The other candle is for a friend from Kuwait who has a sister and 1-year-old niece in Kuwait City. "He was in Kuwait City when it was invaded and had to take a flight through Baghdad to get home" to New Mexico, Marroletti said.
In a neighborhood effort, about 150 homes in Portsmouth's Hatton Point have candles in windows. Martha Jackson of Newport News helped start a candle campaign, called "Light for America," in her neighborhood.
Other residents acted on their own.
"I did it on my own," said Eleanor Brickhouse of Chesapeake.
"Whether we agree with the war or not, we need to support our troops," said the Rev. Charles W. Thompson of Suffolk, who remembers burying soldiers killed in Vietnam and the treatment of that war's survivors as "subcitizens."
Putting a candle in the window is "just one small way of showing our support of the troops, because they are the ones who stand to lose the most," Thompson said.
by CNB