A Dayton veteran who spent his life giving back to others is turning 100 years old next month, and his family and friends are asking for the community’s help with a special birthday surprise.

Master Sergeant Richard Gard will be turning 100 on April 6, and his loved ones are asking the community to send him birthday cards. They are collecting the cards for the big reveal on his birthday.

You can mail a card to: M/Sgt Richard Gard, c/o 70 Pine Street, Franklin, OH 45005

Master Sergeant Richard Gard was born April 6, 1923 in the Ohio half of Union City, and his family settled in the Dayton area.

He met his future wife, Gladys, while roller skating in Dayton. Upon his completion of basic training, Gladys traveled to Louisiana where they were married prior to his deployment overseas. They will celebrate their 79th wedding anniversary in June.

Landing in Normandy on D-Day+3, Master Sergeant Gard participated in the breakout from the beachhead through France to Brest.

During the Battle of the Bulge, he was awarded the Silver Star for gallantry in action. In addition, he earned two Bronze Stars and the Purple Heart, as well as decorations from Bastogne, Belgium and France.

Master Sergeant Gard was recalled to active duty for the Korean War in 1950. After the war, he earned an engineering degree from the University of Dayton.

In addition to the cards, a birthday parade will be held for Master Sergeant Gard on April 6 at 5:30 p.m. starting on Pearhill Drive in West Carrollton.

The parade will feature Centerville VFW Post 9550, West Carrollton Police and Fire, the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office, Harold Schnell Elementary, West Carrolton Marching Band, plus a flyover from a 1943 PT-19A Cornell warplane by the Butler County Warbirds.

This story by: Callie Cassick first appeared on WDTN on 3/15/23

Let’s go antiquing through Miami County! Antiquing is an art form for many people and tells a story of times gone by. Around here, we are all about preserving the past while looking forward to the future.

Antiquing is a fun way to find new things, create new projects, and add a little character to your home. Many people spend hours crafting their antiquing strategies and mapping out the best plans, but we did the leg work for you! We rounded up a few of the most unique spots in Miami County for antiquing.

While all unique in their own right, some focus on preserving the historical meaning of the items while others are focused on giving the old things a new life and purpose.

Unique Antique Shops in Miami County, Ohio

The 3 Weird Sisters Studio

If you are looking for unique, chic art, and antiques, The 3 Weird Sisters Studio is for you! Centered in the heart of downtown Troy,  you can’t miss this unique spot!

Inside, you will find plenty of weird finds for unique minds. The shop features a collection of unusual trinkets, vintage items, handmade and local art, and clothing for men, women, and children.

This unique shop also features various reimagined home and garden decor. It’s a different experience every time you visit!

Location: 15 South Market Street | Troy, Ohio

Midwest Memories Antiques

Midwest Memories Antiques is a vintage-inspired store, located in downtown Tipp City. With more than 100 dealers, this is the jackpot for design inspiration and unique finds!

The store offers a wide variety of furniture, collectibles, and locally crafted merchandise, such as apparel, home decor items, gifts, and more.

In addition to all the fantastic merchandise, visit the salvage area for reclaimed windows, doors, shutters, and hardware to add a little vintage flare to your home. Don’t forget to pick up your favorite shade of Annie Sloan Chalk paint to transform your project into your own.

If you are looking for guidance and inspiration, Midwest Memories Antiques also offers paint services, color mixing, and design assistance.

If you get thirsty during your shopping adventures, grab a refreshment from the in-store coffee bar.

Location: 24 W Main Street | Tipp City, Ohio

Patriot Antique Shoppe

Patriot Antique Shoppe is unlike any other antique shop in Miami County. This shop specializes in 18th and 19th-century American antiques, featuring portraits, quilts, trunks, and many other unique finds you won’t see anywhere else.

This shop is ideal for those who love preserving history and appreciating times gone-by. Aside from the usual antique items, you might also find farming and household tools, like a candle mold, burl bowl, or a tea cupboard.

Location: 15 N. 2nd Street | Tipp City, Ohio

The Mercantile

Filled with primitives and vintage finds, The Mercantile is a unique antique store located in Piqua, Ohio.

Here, you can find a mix of old and new items with a selection of home decor items, collector items, figurines, and so much more! The items in the shop have been sourced from local collectors, auctions, and area estate sales.

As the inventory is never the same, you might find treasures like Carnival and Fenton Glass, vintage mixing bowls, cast iron cooking pieces, repurposed lighting fixtures, and antique furniture.

Location: 415 N Main Street | Piqua, Ohio

Apple Tree Gallery

Specializing in vintage holiday decor, the Apple Tree Gallery is located in the heart of historic downtown Piqua. Year-round you will find antique items to fill your home with glad tidings of the Christmas season, or the spooky chills of Halloween!

If you want something special, this is the place for you!

Location: 405 N. Main St. | Piqua, Ohio

This post originally appeared on the Miami County Visitors & Convention Bureau blog.

The rich, honeyed strains of Bach’s Mass in B minor greet visitors when they walk into his farmhouse in rural western Ohio. Along North Lutheran Church Road in Trotwood, beef cattle munch on the slowly emerging shoots of grass in early spring.

Welcome to the world of Matthew Keener, a former Wright State University music student who took a 10-year detour to ranch in northern Montana before returning to Ohio to raise cattle and now start a nonprofit organization to donate beef to the needy.

Funds from Keener’s nonprofit will be allocated to six different regions of Ohio and used to buy cows from local farmers, turn it into hamburger and donate it to food banks, church pantries and soup kitchens across the state. Ohio will be the test market, with a goal of eventually expanding to three or four other states.

The idea was born when Keener realized that several local golf courses had been decommissioned but the grass still needed to be cut. So he volunteered to mow the grass at the former Madden Golf Course in Dayton for free, turn it into hay to feed his cows and donate beef from some of the animals to food pantries, starting with The Foodbank of Dayton.

“Fresh meat is really an item that we don’t see a lot of,” said Lee Lauren Truesdale, chief development officer at The Foodbank. “Not only is this meat going to feed families in the area, but the program is going sustain farmers and their operations and what they do every day.”

Keener called the hunger problem “absolutely huge.”

“By changing the way we manage the grassland areas that aren’t being used, we can turn that into protein and feed people in the communities that definitely need it,” he said.

Keener’s farmhouse began as a log cabin built by his great grandfather in 1837 on 160 acres just northwest of Dayton. Keener grew up next to it and spent much of his waking hours there as a boy, mowing grass and maintaining the barns.

His interest in music began at a young age. He sang in church choirs, an opera children’s chorus and later with the Dayton Bach Society.

His father, a graduate of the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, taught music at New Lebanon schools and later at Wright State. Keener had his father as a music teacher all through high school and at Wright State.

The opera-singing, French horn-playing Keener currently sings in the choir at Concordia Lutheran Church in Oakwood.

Keener enrolled at Wright State to study music after graduating from Dixie High School in 1995. During that time, he would go to Montana in the summers to work on harvest crews.

“I absolutely fell in love with Montana and one year I didn’t come home,” he said. “I stayed in Montana for 10 years, working on cattle ranches and riding horses.”

Keener said the experience changed him drastically, teaching him to appreciate the solitude and the quiet. He later got rid of his television and rarely listens to the radio so he can concentrate on his own thoughts.

When he returned to Ohio, Keener decided to take over the family farm and start a beef cattle herd. It was tough sledding at first.

“For a long time, we didn’t know if we were going to make it,” he said.

Then Keener discovered Polyface Farm, which is run by Joel Salatin and his family in rural Swoope, Virginia, and is known for using unconventional methods to emotionally, economically and environmentally enhance agriculture. The methods include direct marketing of meats and produce to consumers, pastured poultry, grass-fed beef and a rotation method that creates an ecological system.

After Keener saw a video about Polyface, he had an “epiphanal moment” and jumped on board the farm-to-table movement.

“That is going to save this farm,” he recalled thinking. “I knew that was exactly what it was going to take. So we started rotating cattle. We took row crops out. We stopped using the chemical fertilizers. We started composting.”

Keener said people want to know where their food comes from and that it is raised in a good fashion.

“The consumer is now driving the ship in a different direction,” he said. “They are asking for a better-quality product from farming. It creates more opportunities for people to do what I’m doing.”

Keener supplies about 15 restaurants with meat, most of it wagyu beef, among the most sought-after meats in the world because of its buttery tenderness. And once a month, needy families can pick up discounted beef, pork and chicken from Kenner’s butcher shop in Dayton.

The 43-year-old Keener and his farm have been featured in a documentary film called “Farmers for America,” which highlights the nation’s younger farmers. It was produced by Graham Meriwether and narrated by Mike Rowe, known for his work on the Discovery Channel series “Dirty Jobs.”

Keener said his six years at Wright State combined with ranching in Montana have enabled him to bridge the gap between farmers and city dwellers.

“It allowed me to speak a different language,” he said. “You just have to learn how to navigate different fields.”