DFW AIRPORT, Texas — Most remember the years of American troops going overseas to fight in Operation Enduring Freedom, but chances are fewer remember the massive effort in North Texas during that time to give those troops a hero’s welcome when they finally got some time off.

What You Need To Know

  • It's been 10 years since the Welcome Home a Hero program was in place at DFW Airport. Troops stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan were welcomed home for rest and relaxation

  • The celebrations including a pep rally, bands, cheering crowds and family members 

  • The program was in place at the airport for eight years, from June 2004 until March 2012

  • Participants say the program left behind a lasting legacy and had a positive effect on the mental well-being of our service members 

“They were so tired and they’d come through these double doors and just see this line of civilians cheering,” said Lt. Col. Patrick McAfee as he stood outside the international arrivals doors at DFW Airport with Sgt. Maj. Victor Allen.

McAfee and Allen were first and second in command for most of the Army Human Resources Command’s effort to fly troops into the airport for their rest and relaxation leave. From June 2004 to March 2012, a plane full of troops from various military branches would arrive at both DFW and Atlanta for that time off.

The effort in North Texas would become known as the Welcome Home a Hero program as the Army’s team, alongside local community groups and citizen volunteers, decided to make those returning troops feel like the heroes they deserved to be on their arrival back.

“We had the best job in the military,” said SGM Allen, who is now retired from the Army. “We had a pep rally every morning.”

Was it ever a pep rally.

Allen said every morning the plane would land and approach the airport beneath arching streams of water being shot out of fire engines. The troops would then deplane into the airport where they’d find cheering waiting for them cheering with signs, occasionally with a band playing or patriotic songs being sung, often with service members families awaiting them outside of the security doors to embrace them happily.

Donna Cranston saw the initial Welcome Home events covered on local news one morning and decided to come and lend her voice to the celebrations. 

“My son was in Iraq at the time,” said Cranston.

Before she knew it, Cranston was coming out to the events every day and serving as a coordinator to see that they went off without a hitch and that there were big enough crowds ready for each of those daily arrivals.

Did that ever happen. Photos and videos from those times show massive crowds lined up, waving flags and cheering. At times older veterans would show up, as would school groups, politicians and community leaders.

“The Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts that would come out,” said SGM Allen, “and the kids that would come out and we would see the kids run and grab their parents’ legs and scream, and the tears, and the joy.”

“Everyone was welcomed and it was wonderful,” Cranston said.

Cranston said a major focus of the effort was to create a better welcome home for that generation of troops than some of the previous ones. Many pointed to the tough welcome back a lot of veterans got during the Vietnam War era as something they wanted to avoid this time, at all cost.

That was a focus throughout much of the country in the early 2000s as the troops were given a sort of hero status by most. The Welcome Homes being given daily at DFW even became a benchmark for a lot of other welcome home ceremonies across the country.

“I think it was really great, not only for us, but for them,” said DFW Senior Chaplain D.D. Hayes. “Helped them to kind of navigate, even when the war was over, navigate from that kind of lifestyle to a time when they can get with their families, reunite with them, connect back with them.”

SGM Allen said the daily celebrations even seemed therapeutic for some of those Vietnam era veterans who came out to cheer on the troops and be a part of the effort.

Welcome Home a Hero welcomed back more than a million troops during its eight-year run.

However, the celebration eventually came to an end. In 2012, with the troops rapidly leaving Iraq and Afghanistan and efforts there scaling back, the Welcome Home a Hero program too came to an end.

Today, nearly 10 years after the final pep rally, monuments and reminders to that program are peppered throughout the DFW Airport campus: a shadow box outside the international arrivals door and large monuments at Founders Plaza park are just a few of them.

SGM Allen feels that the program certainly left behind a legacy. Volunteers including Cranston started their own efforts to help the troops. It also led to the better mental health situation many service members of that era find themselves in as well as the fond memories many have of that unique time in North Texas and American history.

“It was a moment where everybody just got along for the sake of the troops, for the mission,” said SGM Allen.