"I'll get my prosthetic leg . . . A Marine shouldn't be in a wheelchair."
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A stunning welcome home
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Lance Cpl. Mark Beyers, seriously wounded Aug. 26 in Iraq, got more than he expected during his Alden homecoming Saturday, including plenty of hugs.
Mark Beyers thought he was heading to play a few hands of Texas Hold 'em with some Marine Corps buddies from Iraq Saturday afternoon, until his father's big pickup truck hit a massive traffic jam in the tiny Village of Alden.
"We better get out of here," Beyers said, before he started realizing that people were lined up three to four deep on the street, waving to him and calling out his name.
"What the hell's going on here?" he asked fiancee Denise Lauck, as it suddenly dawned on him that he was in a parade to honor his return home. "Oh, my God."
"He was in shock," said Lauck.
"I started crying," Beyers said.
Beyers, 27, a Marine Corps corporal as tough as they come, lost an arm and a leg on Aug. 26 when he set off an improvised explosive device while on patrol in Iraq's Al-Anbar province.
He was the most seriously injured of six members from the Buffalo-based India Company of the 3rd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment who were wounded that day.
Beyers was recovering from another surgery in Bethesda, Md., on Oct. 6, when the 180-member India Company had its homecoming, an emotional flag-draped parade down Porter Avenue to its home at the Naval Reserve Center.
But Alden, which sent Beyers and five of his Marine Reserve friends to Iraq, wasn't about to let him sneak home without a celebration.
As a State Police escort led the way with a dozen or more members of the Chosen Few motorcycle club - Beyers wasn't a member but still has a Harley-Davidson in his garage - the hometown hero passed a thousand or so people waving American flags. Signs out front of bars and churches welcomed him home.
The motorcade continued out rural County Line Road to Beyers' home, where American and Marine Corps flags and yet another welcome banner greeted him, along with dozens of fellow India Company members and friends and neighbors.
"Half my company's here," said Beyers, his head shaved bald, grinning from ear to ear behind a pair of aviator sunglasses. He leaned against his father's pickup as Marine after Marine came up to give him a hug. His brother Dave Beyers Jr. handed him an ice-cold Labatts; a 200-pound pig roasted nearby and the sun shone brightly on a crisp October day.
If it was good to be home, it was good for others to see him.
It was the first time Cpl. Daniel Batt of Hamburg saw Beyers since he was wounded.
"I was on the Medivac team, the first responders" Batt said. "He was a hero. Even while he was being evacuated, he was in good spirits, telling everyone else who was wounded they would be all right."
Lauck, his fiancee, has spent every day with Beyers since he returned to the States in September. She slept in a chair in his hospital room, until someone found her a spare bed.
Beyers seemed overwhelmed by all the attention and slightly embarrassed when he had to shift to a wheelchair.
"When I get back [to the naval hospital], I'll get my prosthetic leg and I'll be 100 percent," he said. "A Marine shouldn't be in a wheelchair."
He was pleased to see the turnout of support for him and the Marine Corps. He said he has no regrets about his service in Iraq.
"I remember everything," he said of the explosion that so severely wounded him. "It really doesn't bother me, because no one died."
India Company spent a long, hot seven months in Iraq, mostly in the city of Hit in the Al Anbar province. The company lost one corpsman, Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class Jeffrey L. Wiener of Long Island.
Despite the sunny day and temperatures in the low 50s, some of the India Company Marines, used to the 100 degree days in Iraq, were shivering.
Beyers is spending a month at home and then goes back to the hospital for more physical therapy, and to be fitted for his prosthetic leg and cosmetic arm.
India Company's active tour of duty ends in January, but Beyers is still weighing his future, which he said probably involves going back to school. His father, Dave, said his son has talked both about staying in the Marine Corps and leaving.
Beyers' best friend since grade school, Bruce Luck, who enlisted with him and served in Iraq with Beyers, said it was good to see his friend back on his home turf. Luck and his wife drove to Washington, D.C., to see Beyers the day Luck returned from Iraq.
"It was nice to see he stood right up when he got out of the truck," Luck said. "That was sort of a tear-jerker."
Re: "I'll get my prosthetic leg . . . A Marine shouldn't be in a wheelchair."
By the way: The small town(ship) of Alden is known for things like this. SO are the surrounding neighbourhoods - I've heard similar stories about Olean.
__________________
No time for losers, you make the call
Believe in yourself, stand tall
Another day, it's in your hand
You can be the winner, in the end
The weak will fall the strong remain
No pain no gain
Marine Corps
11-01-2005, 16:05
"I'll get my prosthetic leg . . . A Marine shouldn't be in a wheelchair." 
