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Vet's Message To Students: Vote

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By JULIA FERRANTE, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 15, 2007

Updated: 11/14/2007 09:55 pm

NEW PORT RICHEY - Vietnam veteran Frederick A. Taylor Jr. stood at the lectern Wednesday morning, trying his best to convince a group of glassy-eyed high school students that they should register to vote.

He told the story of a close election in Indiana last week, where a political novice trounced an incumbent who had outpaced him exponentially in fundraising, as an example of why every vote counts.

It wasn't going well. The students' eyelids drooped. Their hands went up to chins. Taylor was losing them.

Then he pulled out the shrapnel.

Taylor called River Ridge High School teacher Tom Fleming and a handful of students to the front of the class.

"They took this from my back," he said, lifting a sharp, heavy piece of metal from a red jewelry box and handing it to the group. "What does this feel like?"

"That's like a piece of your grill, a barbecue grill," Fleming said.

"That hit me at about 100 miles per hour," Taylor said.

Student Frank Wood perked up. "I can't even imagine that!" he exclaimed. "Like, wow, dude!"

A retired Army specialist who served in Vietnam, Japan and the Philippines, Taylor was among five local veterans speaking at high schools this week as part of Supervisor of Elections Brian Corley's "Vote in Honor of a Vet" program.

The speakers, who included war veterans from the Navy and Marines, handed out dog tags and voter preregistration cards as a reminder and incentive to vote.

Taylor, 59, the owner of Suncoast Mortgage Centers in Tampa, earned three Purple Hearts for injuries to his right leg, left foot and back in Vietnam.

"Why is it important to us veterans that you vote?" Taylor asked the class. "We feel we made an investment in America. ... Most of the people with me were either killed or badly wounded. I wonder why I survived. I hope this will motivate you to vote."

Taylor's war stories seemed to resonate.

One student asked whether he ever had to play dead in war.

Taylor said he crawled away from an enemy soldier once with his left foot "shot open" and his right leg "shot in half," knocking on the plate that still resides in that leg.

"Why are you still walking? You're not walking slow," said Ciara Charles, 18, who filled out a voter registration card after class.

Mike Elverd, 17, also preregistered, which will allow him to vote when he turns 18.

"It made a lot of sense," he said of Taylor's talk. "I never really thought about how much it means as when he was talking about being injured in war."

Trisha McCraney, 17, said Taylor also made her think twice.

"I wasn't planning on voting," she said. "He gave me a reason. I figured just one vote wouldn't matter."

Eric Keaton, a retired Army sergeant who planned to speak to a class at Mitchell High School on Wednesday afternoon, said Tuesday that he was looking forward to the event.

"It's a great opportunity, whether you're a veteran or not, to speak to our future about how important it is to have a voice," he said.

"If we can get a couple of voters, it will make a difference. It's not just voting for people, but measures out there like property taxes," Keaton said.

The importance of voting became clear to Keaton while he was serving in Germany, Italy, Panama and the Middle East.

"I'm not going to be the person that says I voted in every election, but after I spent a year overseas and a year in uniform, when I voted I was voting for my commander in chief," Keaton said. "Your vote, whether you're 80 or 18, counts the same."

Reporter Julia Ferrante can be reached at (813) 948-4220 or jferrante@tampatrib.com.

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