The annual program will highlight post 9/11 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. Some 25 local veterans organizations will be set up in the atrium, including  the 25 panel Iraq/Afghanistan Memorial, K9s For Warriors, Florida National Guard Humvees, Rolling Thunder's Missing Man table, Vietnam Veterans of America, the Joe Foss Institute, the Korean War Veterans Association, Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association, Military Museum of North Florida, Veterans History Project, Missing in America Project, and Veterans News Network.

   Patriotic music will be conducted by Dr. Roger Geronimo and feature the St. Augustine High School Chorus and the St. Johns County Center of the Aarts Classical Guitar Ensemble. 

History's Highlight The faces of early Florida From the Florida Humanities Council's Florida's Spanish Colonial Past 1565-1821 Miguel de Escudón: Soldier Miguel de Escudón was a Basque carpenter and sawyer from Vizcaya. He joined the Royal Armada in Spain, but deserted. As punishment, he was sent to St. Augustine in 1573 to serve three years in the military. Francisca de Vera: Widow, boardinghouse owner, laundress Señora de Vera's husband, a soldier, died in St. Augustine sometime before 1580. She supported herself by opening her home as a boarding house and renting rooms, and by doing laundry for other St. Augustine residents. Doña Maria Meléndez: Timucua Chief Doña Maria was the ruler of the town of Nombre de Dios, just outside St. Augustine, during the 1580s and 1590s. She saved the residents of St. Augustine from starvation in 1587 by supplying them with a large quantity of corn grown by her people. Alonso de Escobedo: Franciscan friar and poet Father de Escobedo was the priest assigned to the mission village of Nombre de Dios. During his time there he began a long epic poem called "La Florida' describing his experiences in America. Maria Magdalena Chrisóstomo-Balthazar:  Free woman of color Maria Magdalena's mother, Maria Luisa Balthazar, was a Mocama Timuca Indian from the village of Palica, and her father, Juan Chrisóstomo, was a Caribali African slave living in St. Augustine. Maria Magdalena and her sister Josepha Candelaria were born in their mother's village, and were free. Francisco Ponce de León: Son of the Sergeant Major Francisco was 12 years old in 1676 when his father, the Sergeant Major of St. Augustine, died. As was the custom, the position and pay of the father passed to his orphaned son, who would soon be old enough to serve as a soldier. Francisco Menéndez: African, soldier,  slave, privateer, and leader Francisco Menéndez was a Mandingo born in West Africa in 1704. He was captured and sold into slavery in the English colony of Carolina, but escaped. In 1728 Menéndez arrived in Spanish Florida in the company of Yamassee Indians and became captain of the black militia.