Photo by Andrew Haworth
Doug Graul
AGE: 48
LIVES IN: Irmo
OCCUPATION: Lutheran minister; facility chaplain, Agape Senior Assisted Living
PLAYS: Trumpet, bugle and hand bells
HOBBIES: Cycling and teaching yoga. The body awareness and breath control gained from practicing yoga improve his trumpet playing, he says.
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At a friend’s funeral, Doug Graul listened as the mournful notes of “Taps” paid a final tribute to the Army veteran’s passing. What Graul was hearing, he realized, was a recording.
“When I heard the electronic bugle, I thought, ‘Why didn’t I bring my trumpet?’” Graul recalls. “That would have been something very special, to have actually played ‘Taps’ for him.”
Graul remembered reading, years earlier, about an organization called Bugles Across America. The nonprofit was founded in 2000 to honor the service of military veterans by providing, at no charge, a live bugler to play “Taps” at their funerals. With more than 5,500 volunteer buglers nationwide, BAA constantly recruits to meet a massive need—the passing of an estimated half million veterans is anticipated each year for the next seven years.
Right after his friend’s funeral, Graul logged on to BAA’s website to volunteer. He is now one of about 160 S.C. buglers—men and women, of all ages—who accept “missions” to play “Taps” at a funeral when the family of a departed veteran requests a bugler. More are needed, especially for missions in rural areas.
Graul had played trumpet while growing up but tired of it in college. When his son took up cornet in middle school, it inspired him to pick up his own horn again. He often plays hymns on his trumpet for the residents of Agape Senior and practices daily, to ensure that when his next mission comes, he will be prepared to play “Taps” with the dignity and respect due to that veteran.
“I don’t know that we can ever repay the debt of gratitude that we owe them,” says Graul, the son of a WWII Navy veteran. “But I want to do what I can.”
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Get More
To learn more about Bugles Across America, visit buglesacrossamerica.org or contact N.C. State Director Glenn Traylor by email or call (919) 280-5905.