legion wants to increase membership....

maybe it is the way the article is written, or merely the way i read and interpeted, but what a way to attract membership .....

Afghan mission hoped to boost legion membership
January 29, 2007 CBC News

Royal Canadian Legion branches across the country hope to enlist new members from veterans of the Afghanistan mission, but the New Brunswick legion president says they'll have to work to attract and keep younger soldiers.

Another 120 soldiers left Canadian Forces Base Gagetown for Afghanistan on Monday.

Ken Glaholm, a Korean vet who is a member of the Jervis Bay Legion Branch 53 in Saint John, said he'd like to see the future veterans join up.

"It could improve vastly on the work that we do," Glaholm said. "It's so hard to get volunteers. One volunteer is worth 10 pressed men, as they always used to say."

Tom Eagles, president of New Brunswick's legions, said membership in the province has dropped from 30,000 to 13,000 in the past 30 years.

Edward Guimond has been an associate member of the Carleton Legion Branch 2 in Saint John for 18 years.

"You look around this legion today, and there should be 20 or 30 people in here, and there isn't," Guimond said. "If there's no legions, you don't have any remembrance or won't be the camaraderie. There won't be remembrance of what the women and men did, and fought for."

Eagles said it's up to the legion to keep any younger veterans who sign up.

"When you bring a new member in, you just can't put him back in the corner," Eagles said. "You have to make him feel welcome, and maybe even give him a job."

The average age of veterans of the Second World War is about 85, Eagles said, and some have carried out 50 or 60 years of work with the legion.

Eagles hopes new veterans from the Afghanistan mission will signify a changing of the guard.