Semiquincentennial freedoms are upheld daily by citizen airmen in N.J.

Two hundred and fifty years ago, a group of ordinary men walked into a brick building in Philadelphia and signed their names to the most consequential document in American history, the Declaration of Independence. Throughout this year, and all across the nation, Americans are gathering to celebrate those first steps toward freedom.

Last month, while I listened to the concerts on the Parkway and watched the fireworks over the Art Museum, I found myself thinking about the people who have kept it going ever since.

I have spent nearly my entire 26-year Air Force career right here, at the 514th Airlift Wing at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in South Jersey, affectionately known as the Freedom Wing. That name has always meant something to me, but this anniversary year, it carries a particular weight.

Freedom is not a monument or a date on a calendar. Freedom is a daily act of service, renewed by ordinary people who choose to do an extraordinary thing: raise their right hand and pledge to lay it all on the line for their fellow citizens.

The members of the Freedom Wing are your neighbors. Truly and literally. They teach your children in Philadelphia classrooms. They run toward the smoke when your house is on fire. They wear a SEPTA uniform in the morning and a flight suit in the evening. They are nurses, corporate executives, police officers, and small-business owners. They coach Little League in the summer and strut down Broad Street on New Year’s Day.

And then, when the nation calls or the mission demands, they put on the uniform and get to work. They leave their families, their jobs, and their routines, and they go where they’re needed. No questions asked.

In the Air Force Reserve, we call them citizen airmen. I call them my chosen family and the best people I have ever known.

Since this wing was originally designated in 1949, our citizen airmen have answered the call in every major conflict our country has faced — Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan — and in humanitarian missions across the globe. The Freedom Wing has never sat on the sidelines of history.

After more than a quarter century standing alongside these individuals, what strikes me most is not the mission accomplishments, though they have been extraordinary — it’s the sacrifice that surrounds each one.

It’s the spouse who holds the household together for a sixth month of deployment. It’s the firefighter who tells his crew he has to leave again, and the crew that jumps to cover his shifts. It’s the teacher who builds training plans instead of lesson plans in the back of an aircraft at 30,000 feet, and the students who send hand-drawn cards and care packages.

The uniform isn’t what makes these people and their loved ones remarkable. Their character does. Their grit does. This city is known for it, and so are our citizen airmen.

As Philadelphia continues to celebrate 250 years of this improbable, magnificent country, take a moment to consider how we got here.

Look around for the people who have dedicated their lives to preserving our freedom — they are already among you. Tell them you see them. That recognition costs nothing, and to a citizen airman who has given up more than most will ever know, it means everything.

The truest way I know to celebrate Freedom 250 is not just to enjoy the freedoms we have inherited, but to honor the people who are still out there, right now, making sure we keep it.

Col. Thad Amundson is the deputy wing commander of the 514th Airlift Wing, the “Freedom Wing,” at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New Jersey. The Philadelphia resident has flown combat sorties in Operations Enduring Freedom, Iraqi Freedom, New Dawn, and Inherent Resolve. He is a command pilot with over 4,000 flying hours, 800 hours flown in combat, and more than 5,000 flying hours as a civilian airline pilot.