A veterans memorial plaque stolen from Saco in the 1970s and found in a Connecticut business earlier this year will be rededicated Monday.

The sign for Memorial Field was dedicated to the city’s veterans on Nov. 11, 1953, but was later removed from the field and ultimately taken from Saco by people visiting the city for a softball tournament. It was never clear who first took the plaque from its mount, but it ended up on the wall of a bar in Wethersfield, Connecticut.

Air Force veteran Ron Kendall first noticed the sign back in the early 1990s, and immediately felt it should be returned to the Maine city it came from.

It says: “Dedicated Nov. 11, 1953 to all citizens of Saco, Maine, who served in the armed forces of their country.”

Kendall approached the bar owner about returning it to Saco, but his request was denied, Kendall told the Journal Tribune earlier this year. Kendall said he was told that the people who took the sign felt the act was justified because the sign was found buried in weeds in the recreational field in Saco.

When the bar changed hands decades later, Kendall and his friend Marty Feery approached the new owner about returning the sign to Saco. The new owner agreed.

“It had no right being where it was,” Kendall told the Journal Tribune. “It’s a beautiful piece and I’ve always wanted to bring it up here.”

The Saco Parks and Recreation Department restored and reinstalled the plaque at Memorial Field at C.K. Burns School. It will be rededicated on Veterans Day when the Biddeford-Saco Veterans Day Parade culminates at the school.

The parade starts at the corner of Alfred and Pool streets in Biddeford with an opening ceremony at 9:45 a.m. It will then travel along Main Street into Saco, where it will continue onto Beach Street and Middle Street Extension before ending at Memorial Field.

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