Local VFW post helps 90-year-old veteran reunite with family in Alaska

MONROE, N.C. — On Tuesday a 90-year-old veteran will be getting on a plane to Alaska for a fresh start, and it’s all thanks to a local VFW post.

He is grateful to be reunited with his family and just be somewhere in a much better environment than where he was.

Jamey Helms says it’s their mission at the VFW Post 5464 in Monroe to help any veteran in need, so when the daughter of 90-year-old army veteran Michael Sellars told them her father didn’t have a good caregiver and also needed help with his dog, they didn’t hesitate.

“That was their main concern, to be able to keep his service dog while he was in the hospital recovering,” Helms said.

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Sellars’ service dog is named Buddy. Three times a day for the past two weeks, veterans have been visiting Atrium Union County to walk him. Before that, Buddy himself needed treatment at animal control.

The Union County Sheriff’s Office shared pictures of Buddy getting a bath telling Channel 9 they don’t usually do that, but felt compelled to help.

“Personally, it has been awesome for us too, to assist with this,” said Helms.

He says they wanted to do more. He also said anther VFW and the veteran nonprofit Hand Over Heart got Sellars a wheelchair.

“When I put him in the wheelchair, the first word he said was freedom, and he took off in the wheelchair,” Helms said.

Soon he’ll be off to Alaska to be with his daughter. Helms says the VFW and Patriot Cove in Pennsylvania bought plane tickets. One for Sellars, and one for a local veteran to ensure he gets there safely.

All of this work, to ensure a man who served our country gets the life he deserves.

“He’s ready to see his daughter and be with his family,” said Helms. “And he has a grandchild as well.”

Channel 9’s Gina Esposito also spoke with Sellars’ daughter, Whitney. She said her father had been living with another family member in deplorable conditions in South Carolina. She said he was hospitalized last month for many health issues, including malnourishment and dehydration. Whitney said her father was in good health just two years and had been walking.

Esposito is reaching out to local authorities to learn more.

Whitney also shared the community has been wonderful, and thanked them for everything they did to help her father and his dog. She said her father is a wonderful grandfather, and has a love of reading. She’s excited to see him in Alaska.

Sellars and Buddy are set to leave the hospital Tuesday to catch his flight to Alaska.