For 70-year-old Henderson resident Avie Havelka-Johnson, watching the Las Vegas Veterans Day Parade has become a tradition.

Dressed head to toe in an American flag–patterned bandana, shirt, and jeans, she strolled along South 4th Street’s sidewalk just on the outskirts of the parade route, asking veterans to sign the black POW flag she carried. The annual celebration, she said, “hits close to home,” as the spouse of a Vietnam War veteran.

“This is so rare and nice to see,” said Havelka-Johnson, a former cocktail waitress turned magazine publisher. She spent the early 1990s writing for and about veterans in prisons across the country in a weekly publication called The Voice of Veterans, Incarcerated.

“I waive the flag any time I can, because veterans should be celebrated every day,” Have

See Full Page