The Osage Detachment No. 669 of the Marine Corps League has earned four national awards including one honor recognizing the group for increasing its membership by over 60 percent in less than a year.
The awards were presented by Commandant Ed Lawrence of the state’s Marine Corps League office during a Sept. 3 meeting in Pawhuska. Lawrence presented the awards to the detachment officials after receiving them last month at the MCL’s 86th National Convention in Rochester, Minn.
“(Department of Defense) and Marine Corps medals mean a lot,” Lawrence told the detachment members. “I was extremely proud to accept these for you in front of 400 Marines.”
The detachment was awarded second place for Detachment Increased Membership among those with 51-100 members. It also received the National Junior Vice Commandant’s Citation for the increase in membership.
John Henry Mashunkashey, junior vice commandant of the Osage Detachment, received a Distinguished Service Award and the National Recruiter’s Medal-Bronze also at the meeting.
The Osage Detachment increased by 60.29 percent in less than a year and reported 68 Native and non-Native veterans as detachment members as of August. Lawrence said the detachment’s efforts to increase its membership within the past year are the best in the state, making it Oklahoma’s largest detachment.
The Marine Corps League celebrates the military branch’s traditions and was incorporated by a 1937 act of the U.S. Congress and has over 1,000 detachments in the country and overseas. The league’s Web site is at www.mcleague.com.
Polacca worked for more than two years at The Forum newspaper, which covers the Fargo and Moorhead, Minn., metropolitan area as a weeknight reporter. Polacca previously worked as a reporter for reznetnews.org, an online newspaper. He holds an English degree from Arizona State University and studied news writing at the American Indian Journalism Institute at the University of South Dakota.
