JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Well over one hundred people turned out Thursday to say a final goodbye at Jacksonville National Cemetery... to a man they had never met.
Family members of U.S. Coast Guard member Franklin Burke, Jr. could not be found, according to the Coast Guard command master chief. Those who attended the service said it was one of the largest turnouts they'd ever seen for a fallen service member with no family.
“It’s such an honor to be out here today," said Tom Rowley, ride captain with the Patriot Guard Riders. "Especially for this fallen member who doesn’t have any family. So we’re his family today.”
Some of the only people in attendance who knew Burke were his coworkers from Ecolab in Jacksonville. Joshua Minton made a Facebook post about the service.
“I was hoping for maybe 30-50 people to add into our Ecolab family," Minton said. "Seeing this, it brought me to tears just to see how many people came together.”
He and two other men call themselves Burke's "work family."
“He’s like a dad to me and he always supported me,” said Mitch Garcia, another coworker.
They and CMDCM William Klein with the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Jacksonville say they worked hard to find any of Burke’s family members, but could not.
They said this show of support for a service member with no known family shows the heart of what Jacksonville is.
"We want to support each other the best we can and sometimes it’s not seen, right?" said Klein. "Sometimes you don’t feel it, but on days like this when people realize someone like this has no family, they want to be a part of that regardless of if they knew the person or not.”
Klein said the community needs to honor Burke just as much as he honored the country with his service.