before we continue our program this evening i want to thank the select board of the town of jericho for having faith in the committee which consists of catherine mcmahon's the chair of the select board and squires the president of the jericho historical society or lynn emerson who represents the jericho community center and myself i'm on the board of the jericho historical society we decided last year we've been planning this for a long time to have a celebration similar to what was held in one thousand sixty three on the town's  hundredth anniversary and of course earlier in one thousand and thirteen at the hundred fifty oh it was held in august even though the date was the same june seventh seventy sixty three and it was held here where you're sitting this evening on the green in jericho center and we seldon's very important to have a community event to have families friends and neighbors from underhill bolton richmond with us this evening and commander moore and officer commander myers will make a few remarks later in the program we also this evening are going to honor two families in jericho who have been who are direct descendant of joseph and hannah brown who came to jericho in seventy seven before i will now i also wish of they the boy scout tro centennial committee and chair of the select board to offer a few words catherine i wish to read to you the were present a presentation certificate to the donald round faith family from the town of jericho or  this is better the town of jericho vermont recognizes the donald brown faith family of the two hundred fifty s sisters and ten year anniversary of the charter the select board of the town of jericho and the jericho historical society officially wish to honor the donald brown faith family who or raise on the eve writes a farm at the junction of the road and onion river road jericho vermont and some of whose family members continue to reside in the town of jericho and are direct living descendants of joseph brown seventeen sixteen  who remain with them settled in seven hundred seventy four in unbroken wilderness on the west side of mount mansfield and built a log house near underhill in little south along the banks of the river which bears their name the joseph brown family is buried in the castle that castle cemetery jericho and i wish to also expressed this evening joanne thing brown better yes the town of jericho vermont recognizes the hamlet family on the two hundred fifteen center since ten anniversary of the charter granted to the town of jericho on june seventh seventy sixty three by the honorable governor benny wentworth province of new hampshire portsmouth new hampshire the select board of the town of jericho and the jericho historical society officially wish to honor the hail of family browns trace jericho vermont and some of whose sami members continue to reside in the town of jericho and are direct living descendants of joseph browne seventeen sixteen to eighteen one and his wife hanna brown seventy twenty eight eighty six jericho's first original settler family joseph and hannah brown with their two sons joseph and charles who remain with brown family's very in the castle cemetery jericho this past week i called on ruth hale it who is ninety four and just sparkled and then her niece shar born will receive the certificate on her behalf and sharon is the eighth generation and her granddaughter is the ninth generation so you can see these descendants are well and thriving road crew for making it possible for many of us to be here today possible what does stand out throughout jericho's history is the spirit of commitment to me and the interconnectedness community several good examples can be found around the farm was the first town clerk stewart alexander are the current preservationists of that homestead their daughter jessica is the current town clerk for nearly one hundred years the owner of the jericho center store across the way a town clerk who donated the land that we're enjoying as the he also donated the land that is the jericho center cemetary not only are the buried there but also snowflake bentley a good number of us today are familiar with snowflake manly through the work of blair williams who revived interest in his fire nearing meterological work nationally as well as internationally blair also donated the land which the town library sits across the green from the air and helped organize the moving of the jericho academy building that is the library to the site chait been descendants for school at the academy blair stablished the jericho historical society it was instrumental in the acquisition and restoration of the old red mill the original mill site and the water rights were first known by know it chittenden oldest son of vermont governor thomas chittenden and noah and lewis chabon were instrumental in building the first meeting house on the green for worship and town affairs and again we're bound banded together with others to build the first congregational church that we see behind us restoration of the historic interior of the church and again the church served as a town hall when the current town hall the old school house was being renovated keeping alive in brief the history of the town so we can see that we have a whole full circle of people who have contributed to the town and continue to do so through their families and people who discovered them throughout the years the generosity and commitment of the residents of jericho also continue with the preservation  community center and this is a surprise i'm here also here on behalf of the town of jericho to present a special award to someone who exemplifies the spirit of commitment to community without whom this two hundred fiftieth celebration would not have been possible is a man who cares deeply about the town its history and the history of the state who even when not living in jericho kept track of what was happening always with the best interest of year ago and its history a hard to stories they were relayed to me the truly example of fire this is that when living in the mid east he found out a road sign had been put in the wrong place so he wrote back to have it changed in maine right well so he flew back for the day as not to miss blair williams eightieth birthday party an example i am familiar with is the time spent with then select board chair bob panamint helped preserve the history of the town hall what was being made more fun he also made sure the process was documented for posterity the town wishes to present a special recognition to mr brooks b last fifty years that it helped to preserve its history and character program pleasure now to introduce the vermont national guard forty of the army i might say that my brothers and i have a small connection and a family connection with the forty's and allen artillery range in jericho and of course for these and alan we grew up at the mill house in jericho and i remember well sitting on the lawn which then went down to buy the browns river to root fifteen watching the soldiers march out from forty's and now and go to the forties and now in that silvery rain on the river road in jericho the range has five gardeners give me five  i recall well through the years sitting there on the lawn watching the soldiers marching out from the fort to go to the range and just before they would come to the bridge over the bronze river they would break their marching which i suppose has been done since the roman times when caesar invaded gaul so that they wouldn't and breaking cadence they wouldn't hurt the structure of the bridge i kind of wish sometimes rb trans folks would come back and look at this bridge today and hope that they would think this so that perhaps the romans could come back  my cousin howard buxton is here who is also the commander as many of you know the remote national guard for many years and he was the first chairman of the mt mansell union high schools so that school board for many years and howard would tell me that faithfully every year which is in the agreements with the town of jericho and elin bolton with the u s government military reservation that each year he would hike up with a group of young guardsmen to the stone the try town stone on thousand hill which is where the borders of jericho underhill and bolton come together so i'm particularly honored this evening that the national guard the fortieth army band is with us to celebrate our two hundred fiftieth anniversary birthday party thank you for coming and great thanks to the fortieth army band and gentlemen i'm chief warrant officer david my commander and then master of the forty eighth army been it's my honor and privilege to represent these folks standing behind me we're going to start our program with a very i got into heaven you know i we also weighed our marks i should say in our grade up in earlier today so we come together we also have our media tour training we come up the ethan allen firing range and fire rounds up there once a year like all soldiers do but our specialty is to make music so hopefully we're bringing some great music to you tonight we have people that do things outside of the car that are not musically related from their civilian careers our guitars guitar player over here specialist allen works in the long hair industry during the week our bass player sergeant neal heisman put solar panels on houses all across the state of vermont our driver staff started craig benson is a computer technician our information but it's our beginning also did our arrangement of james bond is a jack of all trades he's a general contractor over in the state of new hampshire on the end of the saxophone line we have sergeant first class nancy warner she is high school band director and champlain new york on the back row start on the end sergeant pak crockett comes to us all the way from the great state of maine one week in the loft is here to make music for you god everybody i hope everybody is ready to dance next we have such a packed truck all the way as we said earlier from going to remain for a five hour drive he does it one weekend a month two weeks a year we really appreciate it i hope everybody's ready  enjoy our take on tonight's concert very pleased to be here and happy birthday jericho evening everyone we are in the green mountain showband part of the forty eighth army band and yet again we have a totally different style of music for you this evening we kind of look like a big band but not quite we're going to do a couple of get one more time one more time sorry this group and i am an amateur control specialist equipment manager for the canon company your service we will miss you don't when i was eighteen years old and it's gone thank you very much we have one more piece for you this evening again we thank you all for being such a great audience after this we're going by the rest of the man back out and we're going to have some more and we've been helping community celebrate around the state for the last two or three years because so many of our towns are celebrating that big fiftieth birthday and i would like to just take a moment and congratulate the share property here in the partnership between the old guard and jericho over the years and so invaluable and thank you from all of us who share this beautiful part of the state with you for supporting the national guard and our time on the base up here thank you just something a little special for you folks you did a little simple arrangement of one song that i think you recognize and we can't sing it because we're going to play it so we need you to sing along and you're going to sing happy birthday did you  so congratulations dollars and your great community going to close with something that is a very very part of our program every program that we do we're going to do a selection of our service so when you hear the service that you have served in your march or if you have a family member that served in that service we would like you to stand when you hear your song and be recognized for your service and everybody please