A team from Joint Base Lewis-McChord's Directorate of Public Works was recognized March 27 by JBLM's Garrison Commander Col. Kent Park for replacing his headquarters building's sign.

JOINT BASE LEWIS-McCHORD, Wash. – When Joint Base Lewis-McChord’s Garrison Commander Col. Kent Park checked out his headquarters building’s sign this month, he realized it hadn’t just been repainted – it looked new.

“I hand-built it all. Every piece on here is new,” said Cory Welch, structures sign maker for JBLM’s Directorate of Public Works.

Park and Command Sgt. Maj. Kenne Hanson, JBLM Garrison Command Sergeant Major, recognized Welch and a group of additional DPW employees March 27 who helped with the project, including carpenters, a painter, a metal shop fabricator, plumbers and employees from DPW’s Roads and Grounds shops. They all received coins for their efforts.

“Thank you so much, because I think this is going to last for a long time,” Park said, adding that the coins expressed appreciation “not just for the sign, but for what you guys do every day that a lot of times doesn’t get noticed.”

The sign, installed March 1, took about 70 hours to make and a few additional hours to install, totaling about a week-and-a-half’s worth of work. It weighed more than 2,100 pounds, Welch said.

“It took pretty much all these guys to wrestle this thing once it was put together,” he said, standing next to the sign with his teammates.

The old wooden sign “had some years on it,” Welch said.

“So, the best thing to do was just to build it at the shop and we rebuilt everything – new posts, new beams, hand-carved out the letters, hand-painted the whole thing, and then got this crew together because it was a big team effort, and we got it installed.”

Metal was wrapped around the bottom of the posts to help prevent damage and prolong the sign’s life.

“It’s wood in Washington, so it’s going to get damaged – it’s going to wear, but we’re trying to make it last as long as we can,” Welch said. “And we’re going to get regular maintenance on it so hopefully it doesn’t rot like the last one did.”

Welch was surprised by the garrison command team’s recognition.

“This is just part of our job,” he said. “We were trying to strive to make JBLM look beautiful and professional. … So, it’s kind of cool that we’re all getting recognized. It’s not just one person, because it did take a team to get this thing to happen the way it did.”

But the job wasn’t just an ordinary task to the command team.

“Everything you do – it’s seen, it’s appreciated,” Hanson said. “We’ve got a beautiful installation because of people like you. Thank you.”