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Show Utah National Guard Birthday, Muster Day Honor Washington frontier neighbors who banded together to-gether for mutual protection. " " Muster Day was planned around an idea started by a Utahn, Brig. Gen. Maxwell E. Rich, Utah Adjutant Ad-jutant General. Last Oct. 8, the Utah Guard "mustered out"; held drill; parades, pa-rades, open house and similar activities ac-tivities to stir up interest in civilian ci-vilian soldering. The results were amazing. There were 546 enlistments en-listments registered for the single sin-gle day. This time 520 men were enlisted, Gen. Rich said. Armed with his idea, Gen. Rich met in Washington, D. C. with the ' national commander of the Guard, Maj. Gen. E. C. Erickson. Gen. Erickson liked the idea and it was adopted for all' units. The militia, said Gen. Rich, has grown from scattered units of rough frontiersmen into one of the strongest forces of the country. coun-try. Over 100 years the guard protected the United States while there was no regular army. He noted that in any war at least 95 per cent of the fighting strength is drawn from the civilian ci-vilian ranks. "We believe in peace," he said, "but we know that the trained man is the one who lives through the fighting." National Guard units have fought in every one of the coun-ry's coun-ry's nine wars plus every battle and campaign. In World War I, six of eight divisions rated as excellent ex-cellent to superior, were made up of National Guardsmen. Utah National Guard is celebrating cele-brating this week for two reasons. First, 'it's the'109fh anniversary of the Guard exact date is Mar. 25, but it was set ahead and second, National Guard Muster Day draws attention to Utah National Na-tional Guard. Because of the opportunity for the dual celebration, the annual Anniversary Ball was held at the State Capitol last Saturday night. More than 3,000 "guardsmen and their guests were present. During the evening, Miss Utah National Guard for 1955, beautiful beauti-ful Joan Mae Schoenfeld, was introduced and plans were announced an-nounced for choosing the 1956 queen. Sharing the spotlight with Miss Schoenfeld was Brig. Gen. W. F. Weiler, who is retiring Feb. 29, and was celebrating his 60th birthday. Gen. Weiler was given a set of four silver serving trays inscribed with the best wishes of his fellow guardsmen. Eight candidates for the 1956 queen title were presented and told that the winner will represent repre-sent Utah during the famous Cherry Blossom festival in Washington, Wash-ington, D. C, and that she will be entered in the Miss Utah contest con-test next fall. Each guard unit is sponsoring a queen candidate. For the second portion of the celebration, National Guard groups of the country are carrying carry-ing on National Guard Muster Day observances. The high-powered high-powered recruiting drive was planned to coincide with the birthday birth-day of George Washington who was an enthusiastic supporter of the civilian tnilitia. Units of |