Campus naval services observe 226th birthday in Plumley celebration

By Dale Mauldin
Norwich Guidon Staff Writer

Music emitted from Plumbley Armory on Oct. 3. Inside, NU cadets were looking their best in dress blue uniforms and evening gowns, having fun with classmates and celebrating the 226th birthday of the naval services.

This year, the midshipman responsible for organizing the ball was Joel Ely, 21, a senior international studies major from Providence, RI.

The responsibility of putting on the ball changes from year to year, according to Ely. This year, responsibility fell mostly on the Marine Corps side of the department.

The result, according to Adam Sacchetti, 20, a senior criminal justice major from Walpole, Mass, was that the ball had a distinctively Marine Corps theme.

According to Ely, every member of the department has a duty assigned to them. The freshmen are responsible for the flag ceremony, with sophomores watching over them to ensure that everything runs smoothly.

"The flag ceremony is going to be two columns of people filing in order of precedence," according to Blake Jackson, 18, a freshman political science major from Rahway, N.J., who was a part of the ceremony. "All the states are going to be in order, from Delaware to Hawaii."

The freshmen practiced an hour a day for a whole week to make sure that they were going to get it right, according to Jackson.

Midshipman William Knox, 23, a junior communications major from Basking Ridge, N.J., was one of three juniors responsible for the flag ceremony.

"The flags looked great," Knox said. "We had a great team of upperclassmen working together to get the freshmen perfect. Between them and the motivation of the freshmen, it was just a matter of practice to get it right."

Other juniors and seniors were responsible for planning other various segments and ceremonies of the ball, according to Ely.

One of the details of great significance that must be handled every year is the guest speaker.

This year, the guest speaker was Lieutenant General Steele, USMCR. According to Sacchetti, General Steele is a former superior officer of Colonel Costa's, the new commanding officer of the Norwich University NROTC unit.

"The General gave a pretty motivating speech", said Chris Bigot, 20, a sophomore sports medicine major from Rockwell, Md,

According to Ely, the navy has ceremonies that are not found in any other service, such as the flag ceremony, which is a representation of the 50 states.

A readings of the Commandant of the Marine Corps' birthday message, along with the Navy birthday message, the poem Old Glory, and the Table for Fallen Comrades are some of the yearly traditions of the Navy/Marine Corps birthday, according to Sacchetti.

According to the midshipmen, the ball was a success. Everyone had fun as they celebrated the birthday.

"We were all out there having a good time," Bigot said. "We had fun, and that was our goal."

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