The Civil Air Patrol was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal the nation's highest ranking civilian award, on Dec. 10 on Capitol Hill in honor of its founding members' role in protecting the homeland against deadly German U-boat attacks during World War II and carrying out other vital wartime domestic missions.

Local residents who were honored were Leon H. Snyder, 91, of Palmerton, and posthumously Richard L. Yuengling Sr. (D.G. Yuengling and Son), of Pottsville.A Jim Thorpe woman also accepted a Congressional medal for her mother, a retired Civil Air Patrol member. Karliene "Korki" Vack, 62, said her mother, 89-year-old Hellenmerie "Rie" Walker, was excited for the honor. Walker joined the CAP at 16, and actively participated from 1942-44. She was living in Jim Thorpe during the sesquicentennial and was named the official hostess for their festival in 1993.The Civil Air Patrol was founded Dec. 1, 1941, six days before Pearl Harbor.During the war members of CAP's coastal patrols, using their own or borrowed planes flew 24 million miles from March 1942 to August 1943 over the Atlantic and Gulf coasts in order to ward off German U-boat attacks against U.S. shipping, especially domestic oil tankers bound for Europe to help fuel the military machine. They did so at the request of the U.S. Petroleum Industry War Council, to guard against the submarine attacks and provide escorts for commercial convoys.Later a German naval commander confirmed that coastal U-boat operations were withdrawn from the United States "because of those damned little red and yellow airplanes."The CAP coastal patrols, flying out of 21 bases located along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts from Maine to the southern tip of Texas, spotted 173 U-boats and attacked 57, and sunk two. They also escorted more than 5,600 convoys and reported 17 floating mines, 36 bodies, 91 ships in distress and 363 survivors in the water.For more on the Civil Air Patrol Congressional Gold Medal journey, including stories by living members being honored go to

http://www.capgoldmedal.com