Tupper Lake community pulls together to help wounded soldier's family

UPDATE


25k raised for injured soldier

Courtesy U.S. Army
1st Lt Bergan Flannigan of Tupper Lake wears the Purple Heart she was awarded after losing her leg while on patrol last month in Afghanistan. Shown with her at Craig Joint Theater Hospital in Afghanistan are her husband, 1st Lt. Thomas Flannigan, left, and Col. John F. Garrity.

The community of 4,500 village residents immediately stepped up to help the Arsenaults. Events to raise money to assist the family were held Saturday in Tupper Lake.

Tupper Lake community pulls together to help wounded soldier's family
By Dick Case
March 07, 2010, 6:00AM
Tupper Lake -- It’s a hard hit for Tupper Lake, a village in the northern Adirondacks, according to Jim LaValley.

Within four years, Tupper Lake has had two of its young people seriously wounded in U.S. warfare thousands of miles away.

Feb. 24, 1st Lt. Bergan Flannigan lost her leg to a roadside bomb in Afghanistan. The 24-year-old Army officer is being treated at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C.;

In June 2006, Josh Jones was wounded when his Humvee ran over a buried mine in Bagdad, Iraq. He lost his leg, also.

“It’s a hard hit,” LaValley was saying to me last week from Tupper Lake, where he runs a real estate company. “You know these kids; it gets me in the gut.”

To help
Donations for Bergan Flannigan’s family may be sent to ARISE at PO Box 1200, Tupper Lake, N.Y. 12986. Make checks out to ARISE Bergan Fund.

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http://blog.syracuse.com/opinion/2010/03/post_24.html