| Article: | Home to a hero's welcome LINCOLN - As Calleen Hartig and her boys, Dalton, 8, Quintin, 7, and Collin, 5, waited outside the stadium at Haymarket Park in Lincoln Sunday morning, they kept a close watch on the horizon.
The Beatrice family was tingling with anticipation as they waited for the Patriot Guard and the bus carrying her husband, National Guard Sgt. 1st Class John Hartig, to pull into the parking lot on Sunday.
The Hartigs were among the thousands of people crowding outside the stadium, waiting to welcome home about 250 Nebraska National Guardsmen from the 1-167th Cavalry and 134th Infantry (Long-Range Surveillance) after a 22-month deployment.
As the time for reuniting soldiers and families approached, the parking lot contained a spectrum of colors and emotions: people lining the streets holding flags, Lincoln fire trucks flying the United States flag high in the air and family and friends dressed in red, white and blue grasping handmade signs welcoming the guardsmen home. |