MAYSVILLE, Mo. - The oranges and umbers of harvest season submit always to red, white and blue in small towns. Crop festivals wash themselves in patriotism.

In a community like Maysville, where the Census Bureau claims about one in six adults are military veterans, an appreciation of service pervades such gatherings.

Today's Country Harvest Parade, the centerpiece activity of the 14th annual fall celebration, will leave an honored place for local citizens Neal Dawson and Bob Barton. The World War II veterans will ride near the front.

It will be an autumn of honors for the men, who have been picked for trips to the nation's capital in November. The Honor Flight program gives veterans an expenses-paid opportunity to see the National World War II Memorial.

On Thursday night, as the festival commenced, the two men took the stage adjoining the DeKalb County Courthouse and accepted the applause of the community. Both have been active in American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars, but like many rural veterans, they mostly kept their own counsel on war-time achievements.

"A lot of them came back home and started farming or whatever their occupation was, they picked up where they left off and didn't really say much," said John Murphy, a Maysville insurance man. "This is a wonderful honor."

Mr. Dawson, whose father owned a car dealership in Maysville, served in the Army Corps of Engineers and earned three Bronze Stars in the Normandy, Ardennes and Rhineland campaigns. After the war in Europe, he shipped out to the Pacific. He left the Army as a first sergeant.

Though he's been to Washington before, this will be his first chance to see the memorial to the war he fought.

"We're very fortunate to get to do it," he said.

Mr. Barton, also a county native, fought as a rifleman in Gen. George Patton's Third Army, learning of the war's end while in Austria. He had enlisted on his 18th birthday. After the war, the private first class served another 16 months in Europe.

Earlier trips to Washington came before the memorial's opening in 2004.

"I haven't seen it," Mr. Barton said. "I've seen all the other memorials."

Edie Lowry of Maysville has worked with the Honor Flight Network and will accompany the men to Washington. At Thursday's ceremony, she noted the importance of local residents honoring the men, "to be proud of their citizens, knowing it's a part of their community they're representing."

Earlier in the day, she had to tell the men of a mix-up that pushed back their departure date from next Wednesday to Nov. 4. Though Ms. Lowry delivered bad news, she noted, "Their smiles didn't change."

Ken Newton can be reached

at kenn@npgco.com.