Thursday, May 9 was a typical morning for Lt. Joshua Manion with the Oklahoma City Fire Department. He was asleep in his bed at Fire Station 22 when he briefly woke up at around 3 o’clock in the morning. He says he looked at the clock and decided it was too early to get up, so he went back to sleep. When he woke up again at 6 a.m. – something had changed.
“I was dizzy,” remembers Manion. “I thought I must have gotten out of bed too fast, so I sat back down. But each time I tried to get back up again, I would lose my balance.”
Manion only had an hour left on duty. He thought whatever he was experiencing would wear off if he just kept moving. He managed to make his bed but felt uncharacteristically uncoordinated on his left side. “I was walking like someone who was intoxicated – and then I became violently ill.”
Manion has been on numerous medical calls as a fire-fighter and has encountered many people exhibiting stroke symptoms, but he says his symptoms were different. “I didn’t have the typical facial droop, slurred speech or weak arms, so even with all my training, I never suspected I was having a stroke.”
Thankfully Lt. Clay Evans, a firefighter paramedic at Fire Station 22, did suspect it was a stroke. He and Major Milton Blackburn rushed Manion to INTEGRIS Baptist Medical Center. The quick-thinking actions of these firefighters quite possibly saved the life of one of their own.
“Joshua suffered a posterior circulation stroke in the cerebellum of his brain. This area is responsible for balance and the coordination of muscle activity,” says Ashish Masih, M.D., a vascular neurologist at INTEGRIS. “There are varying outcomes for this type of stroke from slight uncoordinated movements, to coma, to even death. Joshua is remarkably lucky that his fellow firefighters were able to recognize the atypical signs of this type of stroke and to act as quickly as they did.”
Manuel Fortes, M.D., an interventional neuroradiologist with INTEGRIS, performed an endovascular thrombectomy on Manion to remove the clot that was blocking blood flow to his brain. “NIHSS stands for National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale,” explains Fortes. “It is a way to objectively score stroke symptoms, ranging from a score of 0 to 42. We’re happy to say Joshua has a score of zero, meaning he has little to no deficits as a result of his stroke.” The official cause of his stroke is unknown at this time. He will undergo more testing and will be closely monitored. He hopes his story will serve as a reminder that strokes can happen to anyone at any time. “I’m only 42 years old. I don’t smoke, I’m active and seemingly healthy,” says Manion. “In my sixteen years with the Oklahoma City Fire Department I’ve never taken one sick day. If a stroke can happen to me, it can happen to anyone.”
Manion encourages everyone to learn the signs and symptoms of stroke. He says even though his symptoms were a little different, it’s still good information to know – and may even save a life.
Manion is anxious to return to work and admits he doesn’t like being on the receiving end of a rescue. “I’m not used to people doing things for me. I’d much rather be on the other end for sure. But I think seeing things from the ‘patient perspective’ may actually help me become an even better firefighter.”

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Dear Savvy Senior,

As a teacher for 20 years, I receive a pension from a school system that did not withhold Social Security taxes from my pay. After teaching, I’ve been working for a small company where I do pay Social Security taxes. Now, approaching age 65, I would like to retire and apply for my Social Security benefits. But I’ve been told that my teacher’s pension may cause me to lose some of my Social Security. Is that true?

Ready to Retire

Dear Ready,
Yes, it’s true. It’s very likely that your Social Security retirement benefits will be reduced under the terms of a government rule called the Windfall Elimination Provision (or WEP).
The WEP affects people who receive pensions from jobs in which they were not required to pay Social Security taxes Ð for example, police officers, firefighters, teachers and state and local government workers whose employers were not part of the national Social Security system. People who worked for nonprofit or religious organizations before 1984 may also be outside the system.
Many of these people, like you, are also eligible for Social Security retirement or disability benefits based on other work they did over the course of their career for which Social Security taxes were paid.
Because of your teacher’s pension, Social Security will use a special formula to calculate your retirement benefits, reducing them compared to what you’d otherwise get.
How much they’ll be reduced depends on your work history. But one rule that generally applies is that your Social Security retirement benefits cannot be cut by more than half the size of your pension. And the WEP does not apply to survivor benefits. If you’re married and die, your dependents can get a full Social Security payment, unless your spouse has earned his or her own government pension for which they didn’t pay Social Security taxes. If that’s the case, Social Security has another rule known as the Government Pension Offset (or GPO) that affects spouses or widows/widowers benefits.
Under the GPO, spousal and survivor benefits will be cut by two-thirds of the amount of their pension. And if their pension is large enough, their Social Security spousal or survivor benefits will be zero.
There are a few exceptions to these rules most of which are based on when you entered the Social Security workforce.
Why Do These Rules Exist?
According to the Social Security Administration, the reason Congress created the WEP (in 1983) and GPO (in 1977) was to create a more equitable system. People who get both a pension from non-Social Security work and benefits from Social Security-covered work get an unfair windfall due to the formula of how benefit amounts are calculated.
These rules ensure that government employees who don’t pay Social Security taxes would end up with roughly the same income as people who work in the private sector and do pay them.
For more information on the WEP visit SSA.gov/planners/retire/wep.html, where you’ll also find a link to their WEP online calculator to help you figure out how much your Social Security benefits may be reduced. And for more information on GPO, including a GPO calculator, see SSA.gov/planners/retire/gpo.html.
Send your senior questions to: Savvy Senior, P.O. Box 5443, Norman, OK 73070, or visit SavvySenior.org. Jim Miller is a contributor to the NBC Today show and author of “The Savvy Senior” book.

story and photos by Bobby Anderson, Staff Writer

A couple months ago, Raymond Duncan drove up to El Reno to accept a hand-made-quilt commemorating his military service.
Membership in three difference veterans organizations makes Duncan well known in World War II circles.
And even at 98, he remembers much of what he did like it was yesterday.
Duncan entered into the service in 1942, the year before 5.1 million American young men were drafted.
“No, I volunteered,” he said.
Living in Oklahoma City and working at an auto salvage company, Duncan heard the news that Pearl Harbor had been bombed.
“They were fighting on both sides of this country. I knew I had to be in it,” he said of his later enlistment.
He spent 18 months to the day in the aerial warfare service branch, which would later become the U.S. Air Force.
From Ft. Still to Florida then to Tulsa for aircraft mechanic school he eventually found himself in the 487th Heavy Bombardment Group.
After three months of training in New Mexico his unit was shipped to Europe and Lavenham Air Force Base.
The British vessel the Duchess of Bedford took Duncan and his unit across the pond.
“We led the largest air raid during World War II,” he smiled of the Dec. 24, 1944 air raid that included more than 1,400 B-24s.
That raid – targeting the airfields at Babenhausen, Germany – was led by Brigadier Gen. Frederick Castle.
Castle was air commander and leader of more than 2,000 heavy bombers in the strike. En route to the target, the failure of one engine forced him to relinquish his place at the head of the formation.
In order not to endanger friendly troops on the ground below, he refused to jettison his bombs to gain speed and maneuverability. His lagging, unescorted aircraft became the target of numerous enemy fighters which ripped the left wing with cannon shells, set the oxygen system afire, and wounded 2 members of the crew.
Repeated attacks started fires in 2 engines, leaving the Flying Fortress in imminent danger of exploding. Realizing the hopelessness of the situation, the bail-out order was given. Without regard for his personal safety he remained alone at the controls to afford all other crewmembers an opportunity to escape.
The raid would earn Castle the Congressional Medal of Honor.
Duncan’s days were spent on the ground working on B-24s and B-17s, the latter he still wears an emblem to commemorate on his belt buckle.
He built himself a hut a few feet away from the airplane he would be working on. The accommodations – made out of plywood boxes that carried bombs or tools – were better than the barracks he figured.
The bombers would go out, deliver their payload and come back.
Sometimes they wouldn’t.
“It was more of a solemn situation,” he said. “I never knew who was going to fly my airplane. I didn’t have any idea what would happen. I never knew the 15 months I worked there that I lost a B-24.”
“They were shot down 60 miles southwest of Brussels. I just found out a few years ago on the Internet.”
When he exited the service he arrived in Florida and grabbed the last bus headed home.
“When I got on the bus it was already loaded. I stood up on that bus all night long until we got to Mississippi or Alabama until I finally got a seat,” he said.
Back in Oklahoma, he found a job at Tinker Air Force and eventually rose to the position of supervisor of maintenance and the task of unofficially leading 11,000 workers since he only had a business college degree and not a four-year college degree.
Nevertheless, he spent 27 years at Tinker as a civilian.
Along the way he married and had two girls.
Looking back, he still struggles with wrapping his head around what happened.
“Indirectly, I can say truthfully that I was responsible for killing more people in the war than anybody in Oklahoma,” he says. “Now the Bible says ‘thou shall not kill.’ I don’t know how to feel about that.”
“It’s hard, but there’s nothing I can do about it.”
It was nearly a decade ago that Duncan received a package in the mail with a Presidential citation and a box full of medals his service had earned him.
“I’ve tried to write down a lot of this history I’ve got stitched here and there,” he said.
Most days you’ll find him at the Warr Acres Senior Center.
“This is my home away from home,” Duncan said of his morning domino and coffee stop.
But no matter where he’s at, he’ll never forget what brought him to this point.

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Storm victims with insurance will be protected after a bulletin was issued today by the Oklahoma Insurance Department. The bulletin directs all insurance companies to keep coverage in effect for storm victims for the next 30 days.
“The effects of the severe weather and flooding have made it difficult for Oklahomans to carry out every day activities, much less tend to their insurance premiums,” Oklahoma Insurance Commissioner Glen Mulready said. “This is the time that storm victims need their insurance company to be on their side and why the Insurance Department is calling for a moratorium on policy cancellations.” The bulletin applies to all insurance entities, including health maintenance organizations, accident and health insurers, third party administrators, discount medical plan organizations, property and casualty insurers, surplus and excess lines insurers and county mutual insurers. It includes property and casualty insurance, life insurance, accident and health insurance, disability insurance and all lines of coverage regulated by the Oklahoma Insurance Department.
Some key points of the bulletin are:
* All coverage for storm victims shall continue under all insurance policies for the next 30 days.
* Storms victims can get a copy of their insurance policy free of charge.
* Any rate increases for policies in the affected areas filed on or after the effective date of the bulletin will be deferred.

By Darlene Franklin

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. 31

The year I was born (1954), President Eisenhower added the words “under God” to the pledge. The words hold a special place in my heart, for personal and patriotic reasons. Let’s raise the standard high to the music of Key, Sousa, Springsteen, and Cohen. 44
Although no other flag can replace the importance or meaning of the red, white, and blue in my life, I’ve lived under at least six different flags during my faith like the amusement parks of the same name. To the national flag, I would add three state flags, my family crest, and the
Christian flag. 55
At sixty-four, my life divides neatly into three twenty-year segments. I spent the first score of years in New England, mostly Maine; ten years in Oklahoma; twenty in Colorado; and now another ten years in Oklahoma. In between sprinkle brief stints in New Jersey, Texas, and Arkansas for job and school. 51
The flags for Maine, Colorado and Oklahoma differ widely. They each, in style and content, fairly scream the essence of the state they represent. 24
Maine’s flag depicts a moose laying on grass between ocean and a white pine tree, flanked on by a sailor and a farmer. If the state animal and tree left me in doubt, I couldn’t miss the bold letters proclaiming “Maine.” The state motto, “Dirigo,” means “I lead.” I chuckle to myself as I picture Mainers saying, “That’s right. We’re going to do things our way, and who cares about the rest of the world?” It makes me nostalgic to look at the flag. 84
Colorado’s flag is in your face in a very different way. The bold red C emblazoned upon a blue-white-blue striped background shares its colors with the United States flag. But such a simple design would never rep resent California, and I doubt Connecticut would add a gold nugget in the middle of the C. Clear blue skies, white snow, golden sunshine – that’s my Colorado. 64
The Indian war shield with a peace pipe and olive branch could only belong to Oklahoma. I agree with the words of its pledge, “its symbols of peace unite all people.” Not that Oklahoma has a perfect record—nowhere does—but I love living in a state where contemporary Indian life marches seamlessly and colorfully alongside our state life. 59
If Maine represents my past, and Colorado the stuff of my dreams, Oklahoma represents who I am today—at peace after a trauma-filled past. 24
Research into the crest for my maiden name Sparks revealed several surprises. For one things, “Sparks” is derived from Sparrowhawk, the favorite falcon of Richard the Lion-Hearted. One of his falconers took it as his surname, representing his occupation. When the Sparrowhawk and the Lion-Hearted fought side by side during the Crusades, the falconer saved the king’s life on two occasions. 62
I don’t know with one hundred percent legacy that Sparrowhawk is my ancestor, but it’s possible. I love the family crest. The family motto, “swift and true,” also comes from King Richard—the words he used to describe his favorite falcon. 41
Atop the crest stands a leopard with fire spewing from its mouth. Hmm, a big cat. I’m a Leo by birth, and I wonder if my affinity to all things cats is a family trait. The lively, fiery disposition attributed to Sparks has also been true of me. The green and gold checkered background both suggest the country—Scotland—but also qualities of generosity, elevation of mind, hope. 68
I bet everyone’s family flag holds similar interesting revelations. 9
What about the Christian flag? When I pledge allegiance to the flag and to the Bible, I declare my loyalty to “one Savior, crucified, risen, and coming again with life and liberty to all who believe,” as well as “God’s Holy Word. I will make it a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path and will hide its words in my heart that I might not sin against God.” 72
Combined, they speak to me not of patriotism, but of my core values. I am daughter of the king, my birthright through my Savior, and that brings liberty to me, and to those around me. 35
Let’s take a few moments this month to think about the flags that represent our past, our present, and our future heritage. 22 193

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