Marching band thanks its ‘angels’

To the editor:
Another successful summer season for the Marching Patriots has come to an end.
We have so much to be thankful for this summer. We truly had many “Angels Among Us” this summer.
We would like to say thank you to our generous community, especially The Portland Foundation for our beautiful new uniforms and our new drum line. Thank you to our moms and students that unpacked and checked in our new uniforms.
The promotional committee this year was co-chaired by Tisha Gierheart and Meg Habbeger. This group is very supportive of the kids by giving them cinch bags yearly, the ice cream night, watermelon after a hot practice, ice pops, a cook out, treat bags and decorating the band room. They also staff the hospitality tent at the Jay County Fair Lions Band contest and collect all the donations to make the tent possible.
The Marching Patriots are fortunate to live in such a giving community.
Those Angels donating to our hospitality tent this summer were Portland Pizza Hut, Jay County Hospital, Ponderosa, Buffalo Wings & Rings, Fishers Meats, Marsh, Subway Redkey Pak-A-Sak, Walmart, El Camino Real, Portland Subway, McDonald’s, Corner Stone Antiques, Hairway to Heaven, Payless Pizza, Betsi Skiver, IDC Restaurant, the Northeastern High School Marching Knights and the Jay County Band Boosters. Without their help we would have not had the fantastic meal we were able to provide to all the visiting bands, staff and the judges.
Another group of Angels we need to thank are MainSource Bank for their donation of more than 1,200 bottles of water to help keep everyone going this summer, The Ritz Theatre for donating popcorn for our movie night at band camp, Portland True-Value for donating water for the water canteen at the Jay County contest and the ladies in Delta Theta Tau for baking amazing cookies for our cookout and providing hundreds of bottles of drinks for band camp.
Many thanks also need to go out to the parents and fans of the Marching Patriots for their patience and support.
This summer we also have a very special group of parents that gave a lot of their time to help our program. We had a group of dads (Jeff Burk, Kyle Epler, Chris Krieg, Kirk Daniels, Chuck Denney and Ricky Brown) that became Band Dads this summer. They unloaded and reloaded the trailers at every event the band attended this summer from parades to contests they were there. They also kept the kids hydrated throughout the summer and got the plumes in the kid’s hats.
The kids also had a Band Mom (Treva Newland, Christina Daniels, Beth Krieg, Jennifer Schug, Renae Epler and Terri Burk) assigned to them for the summer.  These ladies had just about everything the kids could possibly need with them in their band bag. They also helped out by getting the kids into their uniforms and making sure that they looked sharp.
We also need to thank Ray Conney and the staff of the Commercial Review. Ray was often seen at practices, the annual ice cream social and spent the day with us at the state fair.
The final group to thank is Kelly Smeltzer and his staff. The amount of time they give up for our kids throughout the entire year is something we cannot thank them enough for.
These kids are all winners in our hearts. They have made lasting friendships that no score can replace.
Thank you once again to all the Angels we had Among Us this summer.
Jennifer Schug
Jay Patriot Band Booster president