Welcome To America
Saovanee Cunningham, center, with flags and a host of friends pose for pictures at Lake McDonald in Glacier National Park Friday after she became an U.S. Citizen. A naturalization ceremony was held in the park. (Chris Peterson photo)
On a gorgeous afternoon, 15 people from 10 different countries were naturalized as United States citizens during a ceremony Sept. 29 in Glacier National Park.
Saovanee Cunningham of Thailand was one of the 15. She met her husband, Greg, who works for Montana Fly Company in Columbia Falls, when he was the manager of the company’s Thailand operations years ago.
When they married and moved back to the Flathead Valley, she knew almost no English and had almost no friends — today she is the social butterfly of the Village Green golf community.
In fact, Greg and their son, Trevor, who is a sophomore and rising star in high school golf, didn’t attend the ceremony because they were at the state golf tournament.
She said Greg offered to stay home and come to the ceremony, “but I said no, you have to pick Trevor first,” she said, surrounded by a dozen or so friends she’s made since moving to the U.S. years ago.
And so it went. Several had either been in the U.S. for years, were married, or both.
TJ Meynders of Bozeman noted he’s a Canadian by birth, but has had a green card for the past 42 years. He decided it was finally time to become a citizen.
While there were smiles all around, it was also a solemn affair at times.
John Johnston, U.S. District Court judge for the District of Montana, presided over the ceremony and recalled his own family being destitute farmers who came to the U.S. for a better life. He grew up in Butte and he remembered his family working hard and sacrificing so he could attend law school.
He also recalled the Declaration of Independence and its tenets of democracy.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” he said.
He warned the new citizens against the evils of bigotry and hatred and how it erodes society and eventually affects all of us and threatens democracy.
Also speaking at the ceremony were Sens. Jon Tester and Steve Daines, and Congressman Ryan Zinke; Glacier National Park Superintendent David Roemer; John Daly, western regional director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; and Catherine Webber of the Daughters of the American Revolution.