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Springfield Veteran of the Year honored

Patrick Keough, 95, is the 2022 Veteran of the Year in Springfield, MA. He is pictured here at a recognition ceremony in City Hall with ( at left) William Walls, chair of the Springfield Veterans' Activities Committee and Mayor Domenic Sarno.
Paul Tuthill
/
WAMC
Patrick Keough, 95, is the 2022 Veteran of the Year in Springfield, MA. He is pictured here at a recognition ceremony in City Hall with ( at left) William Walls, chair of the Springfield Veterans' Activities Committee and Mayor Domenic Sarno.

A 95-year-old U.S. Navy veteran is this year's honoree

Honors have been bestowed on two military veterans in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Like so many of his generation, Patrick Keough, 95, sought no accolades for his military service during World War II.

“There’s so many people who have said ‘ hey why don’t we do this, or why don’t you do this?’ and I just say ‘No, I just don’t want to’,” Keough said.

Now he has been honored as the 2022 Veteran of the Year by the Springfield Veterans’ Activities Committee.

During a ceremony at City Hall, Keough was presented with a plaque and a proclamation from Mayor Domenic Sarno.

After enlisting in the U.S. Navy in 1945, Keough was sent to Guantanamo Bay, where he was assigned to test-fire in simulated combat conditions the big guns on newly-commissioned warships.

“Because of that, I lost my hearing, because what we did was just fire all day long,” Keough said.

Following his discharge, Keough joined the Springfield Fire Department in 1952. He worked his way up the ranks to become a Deputy Chief in charge of the Arson Squad. He retired in 1991.

It was Mary Keough, one of his four children, who nominated her father for the Veteran of the Year award.

“I did all of it behind his back,” she said. “After I was called (by the Veterans’ Activities Committee), I had to go to his house and tell him and he was not happy at first.”

While rejecting any recognition for himself, Keough said he always thanks a veteran for their service and encourages others to do the same. He said he mourns for the lives lost in war and the families left to grieve.

“I feel so-so sorry for some of these people who are waiting for someone to come home and they don’t come,” he said. “That’s awful and I feel so sorry for them.”

Also honored this year as Veterans Day Parade Marshall is Robert Shonak, who served in the U.S. Navy in Vietnam from 1970-71.

“I just have to thank all the veterans and the people who are on active duty, the ones who put their hands up (volunteered), and their sacrifices and what they gave up to serve this country,” he said. “So, I feel very proud.”

William Walls, the chair of the veterans’ committee, announced the group is raising funds to purchase a monument on the Global War on Terrorism.

The record-setting tenure of Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno. The 2011 tornado and its recovery that remade the largest city in Western Massachusetts. The fallout from the deadly COVID outbreak at the Holyoke Soldiers Home. Those are just a few of the thousands and thousands of stories WAMC’s Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief Paul Tuthill has covered for WAMC in his nearly 17 years with the station.