08/20/2025
From the Reconstructed Archives of 1973:
Young Essayist Honored by Legion Post
Ten-year-old Mary Martel, a student at Sts. Peter and Paul School, proudly held up her trophy this week after being named winner of the Kerner-Slusser American Legion Post #63’s annual Americanism Essay Contest.
Mary’s essay explored a theme both unusual and thought-provoking for someone her age: the idea that in the future, people may be identified more by numbers than by names, and that numbers would play an ever-larger role in daily life.
Her teacher, Sister Paula Gero, encouraged Mary as she developed her ideas for the contest. Mary, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Roland Martel of Ottawa, is sometimes affectionately teased by her friends as “Mary Junior,” since she shares her mother’s name.
The award was presented at the Legion’s headquarters, 218 W. Main St., which bears the names of two honored local servicemen, Leo J. Kerner, Private First Class, Company M, 146th Infantry, and Glen Dewey Slusser, both of whom died with honor in service to their country during the Great War.
(This reconstructed article is based on the honest recollections of Mary Martel herself, the photograph she recently rediscovered and information from Kerner-Slusser Post #63 and other sources.)
