Honoring veterans at Bakersfield School: Bakersfield School honors its veterans every day of year

Like some of the other Ozark County districts, Bakersfield School pays tribute to area military veterans this time of year with Veterans Day programs honoring the heroes' service. At Bakersfield, however, that tribute continues all year long in a display case filled with photos of recent BHS graduates who are currently serving in the military. 

"We have a lot of graduates currently serving," Bakersfield superintendent Dr. Amy Britt said in an email to the Times. "Our military enlistment is a lot higher than the national average. I believe that speaks to the community values and pride that exists here in Bakersfield."

Any current students who might be pondering whether the military would be a good choice for their future have easy access to five military veterans who are employed as Bakersfield faculty and staff members and who are happy to answer questions.

Two Air Force veterans in one classroom

Two of those veterans work together in the special education classroom where teacher Tammy Lamb and paraprofessional Kim Yeager teach sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders. 

Lamb, who graduated in 1988 from an Illinois high school near Chicago, enlisted in 1990, leaving the College of DuPage (Illinois) after a year and a half to help support her parents and five younger siblings when her father was stricken with encephalitis. 

Coming from a "very patriotic family" that included a grandfather, Elbert Hobbs, who had served in World War II, Lamb joined the Air Force in 1990, a few months later, after her father recovered. On the other side of the world, Iraq had invaded Kuwait, an American ally, and she felt called to serve. 

She stayed stateside, training in Texas. One of her most memorable military experiences was an unexpected one that happened there. "The first time I had to sing the National Anthem in front of a crowd was when I was in tech school training in Texas," she said. "I was ordered by a four-star general to sing it because they had heard I could! I was scared but also so proud to do it in an auditorium of a couple thousand people. I’ll never forget that." 

With her training completed, Lamb worked as a flight medic in Wyoming through 1992, during Operation Desert Shield, the buildup of troops and equipment in the Middle East and then during Operation Desert Storm, the combat that followed to liberate Kuwait.

After her discharge, Lamb joined the Air Force Reserves and moved with her two young sons to the Alton area, where her family had moved, returning to her grandfather Elbert Hobbs' roots. "My parents kept telling me how beautiful it was in the Ozarks, so that's where I came," she said.

She enrolled in what is now Missouri State University, finishing her degree in 2002, and since then has taught at area schools – Alton, Koshkonong, West Plains and Bakersfield. Along the way, she went through a divorce, earned a master's degree from William Woods University and married Bakersfield-area native Woody Lamb, an Army veteran. Her youngest son C.J. is now a Bakersfield sophomore.

Paraprofessional and fellow Air Force veteran Kim Yeager works alongside Lamb in the same middle school classroom. A 1989 Gainesville High School graduate, she attended what is now College of the Ozarks for a year and a half and was "kind of wondering" about serving in the military when her high school friend, Tammy Strain (Doebler), called from South Carolina one night in 1991 and said, "I joined the Air Force today!" 

Inspired by her friend's enlistment, Yeager went to a recruiting office in Springfield and came home to Gainesville for Hootin an Hollarin that evening. "I met my mom on the square and told her, 'I joined the Air Force today,'" she said, adding that her mom was surprised but knew her daughter had been thinking about the military. 

Yeager served in an Air Force supply facility, mostly at Altus (Oklahoma) Air Force base. She was discharged in 1993, and after a stint at what is now Baxter Healthcare (known locally as "the lab") in Mountain Home, Arkansas, she joined the paraprofessional staff at Bakersfield School and has been there 14 years.

Yeager's son Cameron, a 2018 BHS grad, and her daughter Ashton, a 2021 BHS grad, are currently serving in the Army. Cameron has worked in human resources in Colorado Springs and was recently chosen for drill sergeant training. He expects to be stationed at Fort Leonard Wood near Waynesville next spring, after his training is complete. 

Ashton "shoots cannon for a living," her mom said. Not long after the Army began accepting females into combat arms, Ashton joined as a cannon crew member. She's now stationed in Colorado, where the 5'4" soldier helps fire between 80 to 100 of the huge, 120-pound shells each day.

On a pin map in Yeager and Lamb's classroom, their students have followed BHS graduates' military locations, including Cameron's tour in Iraq and his year in Korea. "It teaches them about the world," Yeager said. "I share pictures, and sometimes we Facetime and the students ask questions. When he's home, Cameron makes appearances here. The kids know about what it means to serve."

 The students show their respect consistently, including each morning when the Pledge of Allegiance is said. "They know we stand up straight and tall," Yeager said. 

Graduation – then immediate enlistment

Military service began immediately after high school graduation for Bakersfield High School principal Doyne Byrd. Part of a family that included uncles and cousins who had served in the military, Byrd left home for Marine Corps boot camp three days after his graduation from Mountain Home High School in 1986. "It was a short summer," he said last week with a laugh. 

After completing basic training and infantry training, he returned to Arkansas and enrolled in what is now Harding University in 1987. He was called to active duty in November 1990 and deployed with the Marines to serve in Desert Shield and Desert Storm in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. 

After finishing his active duty, he served in the Marine Reserves until his discharge in 1993, when he joined the Bakersfield School faculty as a coach. Since then he has also taught in Gainesville and Cotter, Arkansas, but returned to Bakersfield 14 years ago and has been there ever since. Now high school principal, he also holds a master's in education administration from William Woods University.

He met his wife, Margaret, while they were both enrolled at Harding. They’ve been married 32 years. 

Bakersfield students have shown interest in his time with the Marines. “They’re always curious,” he said, adding that, in general, middle school students seem to ask more questions than high schoolers. 

In addition to casual conversations with the students, Byrd has shared his experiences in the Middle East during talks in Bakersfield’s social studies classes. “Most discussions are usually about the culture and the difference in the Muslin faith and Christianity,” he said.

The Byrds have two sons, Daley, who’s currently an Army first lieutenant posted at Fort Bliss, Texas, and David, who recently graduated from College of the Ozarks.

A veteran on active duty

Veteran Wayne Romans, a 2000 Bakersfield High School graduate, currently serves as a reserve deputy with the Ozark County Sheriff’s Department and is the Bakersfield district’s full-time school resource officer.

He enlisted in the Air Force in 2001, completed basic training in Texas and then served in Okinawa, Japan. Three years after his discharge, he joined the Army National Guard, in which he remains active, holding the rank of specialist. His job, no surprise, is with the military police.

Romans has completed three one-year deployments with the National Guard’s 1175th MP Company. His first deployment was to Afghanistan, and his second was to Kuwait. His third deployment, completed in February 2022, was in Cuba.

His military experience makes Romans a veteran – and also a soldier on active duty with the Guard.

20 years in the Navy

Bakersfield’s technology director, Von Farr, didn’t plan to spend 20 years in the Navy when he got the idea of enlisting from a roommate in Joplin, where he worked after graduating from Mountain Grove High School in 1983. The roommate “gave me the lowdown on the Navy,” Farr said, and after enlisting in 1985, he headed to the Navy’s Great Lakes Training Center near Chicago. 

His next step after basic training was learning to be a Navy electronic warfare specialist – a military job he chose mainly because he liked the idea of being in Pensacola, Florida, for three months for that first school, he said. “My job was to deter the Russians. We were always looking for Russian missiles,” he said. 

His first cruise, out of San Diego in 1987, took him throughout the western Pacific: “Hawaii, Philippines, Australia, Thailand – it was a fun tour for a young guy,” Farr said. “I was having a good time, enjoying my career.”

Back in Pensacola, he trained to be a technician on the electronic warfare equipment he’d been operating. By the time he’d completed his third Navy cruise, he was married to a fellow sailor. The only place they found where they could serve together was in Alaska, so off they went. In that move, Farr changed jobs and shifted from electronic warfare to Navy law enforcement, a job he held for 11 years.

He was on his sixth cruise in Sept. 11, 2001, when America was attacked by terrorist hijackers. “We were in Lima, Peru. I was in the chiefs’ mess. We got Armed Forces Network TV, and we were watching the same news the rest of America was watching. We immediately went into reactive mode – pulled all our people out of Lima and got underway. We were basically in No Man’s Land, out at sea waiting for orders. We thought we might be sent to New York to help there; we had a lot of sailors from New York. But then the Navy said to continue with our original South American tour, sort of a dog and pony show,” he said.  

Before his Navy retirement in 2006, Farr also served in Nevada and on Diego Garcia, a military installation nicknamed “The Rock” for its location on a beautiful, remote island in the Indian Ocean. 

Now in his second marriage, he and wife Cindy live in Dora, where they settled after Farr left the Navy behind in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Farr has one son, Erik, who lives in Costa Rica. 

For 10 years after moving to Dora, he worked for Grennans Communication in West Plains. His work with that company included helping Bakersfield School set up a security system in its new addition. Five years ago, he joined the school district full time as technology director. 

“I think my favorite part of the job is that every day is something different. It’s sort of like the military. You can’t predict what will happen with the kids. They’re a lot of fun, and they keep you young,” he said. “It gives you hope about society.” 

Farr laughs, sharing that the students are “constantly trying to outsmart Mr. Von, but I have them convinced that I can hack into anything.” 

He encourages students to consider going into the military after graduation. “I probably push it on them more than them coming to me and asking – because I wish someone would have pushed it on me in high school,” he said. “To have those doors open up for you – I don’t think they understand the opportunities it brings. I believe that, as a young adult, you need to get outside your county; you need to see a little more of America, to understand that there are differences. And that really happens when you go overseas.”

He tells students who aren’t planning to go into the military that it’s a good idea to at least take the test (the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery Test, an enlistment requirement). “You need to get that score and have everything set in place. Then, if your Plan A doesn’t work out, and your Plan B doesn’t work, maybe your Plan C could be joining the military,” Farr said, adding that he believes “everyone should serve their country for two years,” whether it’s in the military or civil service or some other way.” 

Honoring veterans

Faculty members Cassie and Kyle Dillinger, sponsors of the junior and senior chapters of the National Honor Society at Bakersfield, are in charge of this year’s Veterans Day program, which begins at 11 a.m. Friday, Nov. 11, with a free lunch to be served to veterans and their spouses in the school’s FEMA building.

Afterward, the veterans will gather in the gym with all the students for a schoolwide Veterans Day program led by the Honor Society students. 

Air Force veteran and Bakersfield paraprofessional Kim Yeager is this year’s speaker. Attending veterans will be recognized, and door prizes – gifts brought by students – will be presented. The youngest students have also made cards and letters they will give to the veterans. 

All area veterans and their spouses are invited. RSVPs are not mandatory but are encouraged to ensure that enough food is prepared. For more information, call the school 417-284-7333.