The Hy-Vee Veterans Voyage program annually expresses appreciation by sending veterans and guests to a Vikings road game. It also included hosting the group last Sunday at Minnesota's home Salute to Service game, which featured an on-field recognition and surprise of free Hy-Vee groceries for a year for five families. The group will visit New York, including the 9-11 Memorial, when the Vikings play the Giants in December.

Please join us in recognizing steadfast service and relentless courage of this year's group.

Ret. Petty Officer 1^st Class Devin Kelly

U.S. Navy | 20 years

Kelly followed his father and grandfather by serving in the Navy, so it's understandable that his commitment would run deep. The hospital corpsman went far beyond expectation.

While on a 2006 "greenside deployment," he can remember the fireball rushing into the military truck, which flipped three-and-a-half times after striking an IED along Route Bronze.

"After that, I remember seeing ground, air and then getting hit in the face," Kelly recalled. "Then I woke up on the ground.

"Some of the other Marines were around me, and they asked me if I needed help or anything. And I just said, 'Give me a pressure dressing and go help the Marines.' My junior corporal, he ran up to me, and he was like, 'What do you want me to do?' And I was like, 'Just go help the Marines.' So then I stood up, and when I stood up, I put the pressure dressing to my face, and I almost passed out because my bones were rubbing against each other. I tried to take a couple of steps, and I ended up sitting back down, and then another corpsman sat there with me and treated me. But I don't remember very much after that. I remember waking up in Al Asad [Air Base], where I got to call my wife and tell her what had happened."

Kelly's wife Amanda also was serving at the time, and the couple combined for 10 deployments.

"It's just picking up where one person leaves off, and we managed to make it work," Kelly said. "It takes a lot of patience and a lot of understanding."

He deployed to Afghanistan in 2005 and Iraq in 2006. He was awarded a Purple Heart, and after recovering from his injuries enough to be cleared to continue serving, Kelly deployed to Afghanistan in 2010 and 2013 and Spain in 2015. He retired in 2022.

He said he "loved every second of being deployed" because of the camaraderie and unique relationships that formed through shared service.

"I still struggle with some of the recovery; even now my back hurts and different things hurt. But you always get that mentality of pushing through it and getting whatever job or whatever mission that you have done and then continuing," Kelly said. "So I think it was just a mental state of pushing through and making sure that you're taking care of whatever needs to be done. And I loved training and building up the new corpsman. That was what we did it for."

Ret. Maj. Chad Wendolek

U.S. Army | 26 years

Enticed by the potential benefits offered through the GI Bill to help pay for college at North Dakota, Wendolek enlisted at 17 years old, he explained after shouting out former UND and Vikings fan fave Jim Kleinsasser.

"My dad loved it, and my mom hated it. At 17, I couldn't sign the contract legally, so they had to sign it for me," Wendolek said. "It took my dad some convincing to get my mom to sign that contract."

He participated in ROTC at college and then was able to attend U.S. Army Airborne School at Fort Benning, Georgia, in the summer of 1996, becoming a master parachutist who worked in explosive device neutralization during deployments.

"I ran around Fort Benning, jumped out of planes, came back and said, 'I definitely want to stick around and do this for a while.' When I started to get close to graduating college, one of my mentors at the ROTC there, they were like, 'You're good at what you do, and I think that you would enjoy going on to active duty.' So I put in a packet to go on active duty, was selected to be an active duty officer in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and got my commission upon graduation, and went down to Fort Hood, Texas."

Wendolek was there on Sept. 11, 2001, a Tuesday morning that began with physical training.

The native of Lester Prairie completed deployments in Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan working to clear routes. He fully understands the sacrifices made by military families. Later in his career, access to communication while deployed

"My oldest was 11 when I went off to Afghanistan," Wendolek said. "He knew — he can watch TV and see — that Dad's not going to a friendly place, right? You know he's going to be gone, and you don't know if you're going to see him again, but, they do it. … I tell everybody that it's much harder to be the family and watching the person go than it is to for the soldier who's deploying. Because when you go over there, you're just focused on one thing."

Wendolek eventually worked at the Pentagon and has also visited Shanksville, Pennsylvania, but this will be his first visit to the 9-11 Memorial.

Ret. Master Sgt. Guy Sing

U.S. Army | 20 years

Sing's interest in joining the military began with watching movies like Rambo while growing up in St. James but being a soldier — and eventually developing others — was part of his destiny.

"I just loved it. Whenever there was a chance to re-enlist, I did," Sing said. "There's nothing else out there for me to do that I could really be happy with. The great thing about the military is that there's always goals, and you know what those goals are, and you're just kind of instructing them how to achieve those goals."

He enlisted at age 17 and eventually completed air assault and master rappel schools before becoming a drill sergeant, a role ascended to by roughly 10 percent of troops.

"I had really strong, great role models," Sing said. "I was like, 'That's who I want to be someday.' And they carried themselves with a lot of honor. "It was a great honor to be a drill sergeant, and it's one of the most demanding assignments."

Sing, who was at Fort Knox, Kentucky, on 9-11, completed two deployments to Iraq and one to Kuwait. This will be his first trip to New York.

Sing's post-service duties included guiding groups through the United Heroes League's obstacle course in Hastings. He is now working to help veterans access benefits in Olmstead County — a soldier helping others.

"It's a really special moment to help those that really didn't think that they could receive any kind of benefits from the VA," Sing said. "It's my Vietnam veterans. We all know about Vietnam veterans, we all know about the Vietnam War, but to actually sit down and discuss their experiences and all the chemicals that were thrown at them during that war, and all those conditions that are caused by those chemicals that they were exposed to, it's eye-opening.

"And then, the war itself. I served with all the technology. They didn't have that technology. They had incandescent light bulbs in their flashlights. They didn't have GPS or night vision," Sing continued. "So just to hear their stories and how they were fighting this massive war against a relentless enemy with hardly anything in a very nasty terrain and environment — those people need my help. Those families need my help. Those widows, those surviving spouses, need my help. That's what I really love about my job. It's providing that help for them."

The fact that many soldiers who served in Vietnam were mistreated when they returned is not lost on Sing.

"We were given everything in my generation. We were handed so much. The welcome home was amazing," Sing said. "That's what you look forward to when you're in a deployed situation, is that welcome home, that day when you're reuniting with your family, and they didn't have that. They had to take the uniform off in San Francisco. And then, of course, they didn't have all these benefits."

Ret. Sgt. E5 Roger Boyd III

U.S. Army & MN Army National Guard | 14 years

Boyd continued a line of service established by his grandfather (Army during Vietnam) and father (Air Force). Originally from Memphis, Tennessee, Boyd moved to Minnesota as a senior year in high school. He played receiver at Mankato West and enlisted at age 17.

Boyd's relentless commitment showed when he and other service members were aboard a plane home from Iraq before Easter but deplaned after orders were extended. The deployment lasted 24 months total.

"That was actually the longest deployment that Minnesota National Guard soldiers had, because we got extended, and the families knew back home before we knew we got extended," Boyd said. "My mom and wife knew I was extended before I did. I'm on the phone with my mom and dad and my wife and they go, 'Hey, you guys just got extended.' I said, 'What are you talking about?' "

Boyd said he's "a much better person" from what he observed and learned while on deployments. He loved the adrenaline rush of parachuting, and he also served in infantry and field artillery roles.

The Salute to Service initiative "means the world to me because of what the veterans sacrifice," Boyd said.

Ret. Spc. Maraya Leino

MN Army National Guard | 9-plus years

Leino was 10 years old on Sept. 11, 2001, riding a school bus. Another student boarded and shared the news. Upon arriving at school, televisions were wheeled in.

"Everybody stopped, and all we did was watch the broadcast all day," Leino said. "We watched George W. Bush get on and make his announcement. I remember so many details about that day. It truly did shape how I wanted to serve and why I wanted to serve."

The Sturgeon Lake native deployed to Kuwait in 2011-12 in support of the Iraq drawdown and served as a gun truck operator and rotating gunner.

Leino's husband Andrew is currently serving, and both lean on values of military service as they raise their three kids.

"My husband still is currently serving, so I'm always around veterans, and it's just like a big piece of who we are and how we work as a family," Leino said. "Most people find a hard time understanding it, but we are family no matter what branch of service we served in, no matter how young or old we are, we all share some sort of the same experience, and it's just easy to talk to everybody."

Asked what the Salute to Service initiative means to her, Leino said, "I think it is a time for the general population to reflect on what these people have done for their country or done to help aid their freedoms. It's a great thing. I've always loved watching the Salute to Service games, but what it means to me is, I think it's a time to stop and remember everybody, from young to old service members."