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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nThe dedication is set for 10 a.m. at the WWII Plaza, 150 Lake Beulah Drive, west of the RP Funding Center<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The monument\u2019s dedication, jointly sponsored by the Polk County Veterans Council and the Lakeland Chapter of the NAACP, will recognize those who served in combat or support services during WWII, both overseas and in the U.S., Veterans Council Chairman Gary Clark said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The text on the monument reads:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
THE GREAT AFRICAN AMERICAN GENERATION<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n This monument pays tribute to all of those Polk County African Americans who served in WWII. Their service to the the country would continue long after the battlefields of World War II grew silent.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n More than one and a half million African Americans served in the United States Armed Forces during World War II. As members of the U.S. military, this great African American generation frequently encountered unequal treatment and limited opportunities for promotion and transfer. Despite these challenges, Polk County African Americans joined the war effort serving in combat and combat support units both overseas and in the United States. Jordan \u201cJ.J.\u201d Corbett was one of them. Enlisting in 1943 and serving in the \u201cTriple Nickle\u201d 555th parachute infantry battalion nicknamed \u201cThe Smoke Jumpers, these soldiers conducted dangerous missions parachuting out of planes to extinguish forest fires.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Another WW II veteran was Lemuel Geathers who, after graduating as valedictorian of all-black Jewett High School in 1943, joined the U.S. Navy at age 19. He became one of the first African Americans to be trained by the Navy as an electrician. Following the war, \u201cJ.J.\u201d Corbett joined millions of fellow Americans from the greatest generation achieving success in multiple careers and became a leader in his community. Lemuel Geathers earned a degree from Florida A&M University under the GI Bill and became an educator and businessman in Polk County, later becoming Winter Haven\u2019s first African American mayor<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This monument made possible through the support of the veterans and friends of veterans, November 6, 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lakeland Rotary Clubs, City of Lakeland, Polk County Veterans Council, NAACP Lakeland Branch, American Legion Post 4, Central Florida Business Diversity Council, the Corbett family, the Geathers family, individual donors, Sweetdreams Memorials<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A monument honoring Polk County\u2019s World War II African American soldiers will be dedicated in Veterans Memorial Park on Saturday. The dedication is set for 10 a.m. at the WWII… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16690,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[1602],"class_list":["post-16689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","tag-monument-to-african-american-wwii-soldiers-will-be-dedicated"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16689\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}