Tony Hake, owner and operator of ThorntonWeather.com has made a personal donation of $557.00 to the Thornton Veterans Memorial Foundation and their Vietnam Traveling Memorial Wall event. Tony is also chairman of the foundation and made the donation as a way to, “put his money where his mouth is.”
Fundraising for the memorial and the event requires contributions from all area businesses, service organizations and citizens. As a six year veteran of the United States Navy who served in the Persian Gulf, Tony has a special connection to this project. Tony said, “It is important that we honor our veterans as well as those who are in uniform today defending this nation on shores far and near. The Thornton Veterans Memorial will be a small way to say thank you to these brave men and women for their service.”
Of all the war memorials, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial – the Wall – arguably invokes the strongest emotional reaction of any and it is the single most visited memorial in the country. In order to allow more people to experience it, veterans organizations have created 3/5 scale versions that now travel the country making appearances at various events. Just the presence of the wall draws thousands of visitors at every location. It is not merely something that is seen – it is something that is experienced.
It is with this in mind that the Foundation, working in conjunction with the city of Thornton, has arranged to bring the traveling wall to the city during its annual Independence Day celebration. The Wall will be available for public viewing 24 hours a day beginning on July 3 through the morning of July 7 at the multipurpose fields at the Margaret W. Carpenter Recreation Center (11151 Colorado Boulevard, Thornton, CO 80233).
Tony is challenging all area businesses and service organizations to match or exceed his own personal contribution to the memorial project and the Wall event. Tony said, “If we can’t find it in our hearts to honor our veterans, then there is no one worth of honoring.”
Tony also asks all area citizens to help out in any way they can. Volunteers are needed for the event for those so inclined. Donations from citizens in ANY amount are welcome and will help make this memorial possible. Also remember that the Foundation is a registered non-profit 501(c)(3) organization so your donation is tax deductible!
Please use the following links to learn more:
The Thornton Veterans Memorial website
Donations can be made online at the memorial’s online store using a credit card.
Cash donations may be mailed in using the contact information here.
March in Denver typically means frequent and rapid weather changes. The days grow longer and we start enjoying more sunshine and sometimes summer-like weather. However, on occasion arctic air masses can still force their way south into Colorado dropping temperatures quickly and markedly. Occasional thunderstorms do start to happen in March as well.
We have been busy the last couple of days with some pretty neat enhancements to our website. The most obvious one being the addition of a “fly-out” menu on the left. The previous menu was getting quite lengthy as we added new features to the site. The new menu allows us to group items into main menu categories that when moused over then open a list of related items. This should make it easier to navigate plus allow you to better see items that you may be interested in. 
The lunar eclipse last night started out a bit rough with some light cloud cover obscuring the view. However, a bit before the eclipse was at its maximum, the clouds cleared and we ended up with quite a nice view. As an added treat, Regulus and Saturn were clearly visible and very bright above and below left of the moon.
An interesting editorial recently in Investor’s Business Daily addresses concerns among many scientists no about global warming – but global cooling. These scientists of course don’t receive the press that Al Gore and the “man made climate change” groups do but their voice is starting to be heard. They don’t necessarily dispute that man can have an effect on the climate but they do dispute the amount of effect and they caution that there may be other, greater forces at work – solar activity for one. From the article:
An interesting 
Updated 2/14/08, 4:45pm – In the end, a pretty typical late winter storm. A decent bit of moisture in the snow that fell and it is already mostly melted. 🙂 ThorntonWeather.com recorded 2.6 inches of the white stuff which is below the low end of what was originally forecast. It was a pretty stark contrast though between Wednesday when we reached a high of 69 and today with a high of only 32 – a difference of 37 degrees in just a single day!