Salvation Army

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=====Robert Gueiss=====
**Robert "Bob" Gueiss** was a member of the [[East Stroudsburg PA|East Stroudsburg Salvation Army]].

^Robert Gueiss||
^Birth Date|September 5, 1936|
^Death Date|September 20, 2016|

====Salvation Army's Bearer Of Salvation Wins Award=====
For 18 years, Robert Gueiss has been in charge of maintenance at the Salvation Army in East Stroudsburg.
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And for 18 years, Gueiss has been maintaining the spirits of emergency personnel and the homeless. He provides everything from food and drink to firefighters, to a warm place to stay for those in need of shelter.
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For his efforts, Gueiss received the Pocono Mountains Chamber of Commerce's community service award Tuesday.
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"It's for unsung heroes who do something above and beyond the call of duty," said chamber member Bruce Denlinger, who presented a certificate to Gueiss. "Whenever there's a fire, he's always there. If someone is homeless, he'll find a place for them to stay."
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"This is a surprise," Gueiss, 61, said after the ceremony during the chamber's monthly meeting, held at the Pocono Four Points Sheraton. He said he especially enjoys going to fire scenes with his canteen server - a kitchen on wheels. From it, he serves firefighters donuts and coffee. If the firefighters need to stay at a fire or accident scene longer than usual, he'll bring them sandwiches.
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"He's the on-call person for anyone passing through town who needs a place to stay," said Salvation Army [[Mark Mackneer|Capt. Mark Mackneer]]. "He's on call in the middle of the night."
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Asked if he minds getting calls in the middle of the night, Gueiss said, "No, not really."
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"That's his duty," said Gueiss' wife, Lucy.
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"She never wakes up when I get the calls," Gueiss added with a laugh.
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"I answer some calls," she countered.
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//Pocono Record, May 27, 1998//

====Community Is In Shock In Storm's Wake; Valley Residents Lost Weekend Homes In Pike County To Apparent Tornado====
The caretaker led the two visitors up the hill, past the shards of glass, askew oaks and pines, roofs with patches, fallen Speed Limit 15 sign, uplifted garage, twisted aluminum and power lines lower than a beetle’s belly.
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“As you go up, it just gets worse,” warned Terry Palazzolo, caretaker of the Blue Heron Lake community in Porter Township, Pike County. “It’s going to take your breath away.”
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Pointing to a pile of wood, she said, “This was a house.”
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Bob Wuesthoff’s first-floor bedroom became a basement. Donald Rohrbach’s living room was in the lake, a good distance from the mounted moose head that lost its antlers. Pat McCoy’s roof was in her back yard.
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“I got a good deal on a house,” said Wuesthoff, a Coopersburg resident, surveying the buried walls and roof that framed what used to be his hunting and fishing refuge.
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“It’s a do-it-yourselfer.”
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With Wuesthoff away Sunday night and his Blue Heron Lake community neighbors emerging mostly unscathed from apparent tornadoes that destroyed three homes — one of them occupied –he could afford to muse.
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“There’s no way we would have survived,” said Wuesthoff, who was on his way to an organ-installing job in South Carolina when his two-story saltbox home in this bucolic community was battered beyond recognition.
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The bed, formerly on the first floor, rested in the basement. The apparent tornado lifted four of his fishing boats: one to a tree, one to the road, one to the woods and the last under rubble.
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Oddly, a mirror and woodpile remained untouched.
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Because the storm arrived Sunday night, when many of the weekend residents were headed home, few residents of the 65-shareholder, 72-year-old community were at Blue Heron Lake.
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McCoy was at her other residence in Hanover Township, Northampton County, when the apparent tornado crumbled the roof of her Blue Heron Lake modular home like a month-old cookie.
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“I’m in shock,” she said Tuesday above the din of backhoes, wood chippers and all-terrain vehicles, the popular mode of transportation in the 43-home community.
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“You can’t believe it until you see it,” said McCoy, who was alerted to the damage by Allentown resident Linda Signarovitz, another Lehigh Valley resident who owns a vacation home at Blue Heron Lake.
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The National Weather Service in Binghamton, N.Y., thinks Pike was visited by tornadoes for the first time in more than 40 years.
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To hear Bob Gueiss tell it, you have to go back at least that long to find anything resembling the devastation of Sunday night.
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“It’s as bad as the ’55 flood,” said Gueiss, who runs the traveling canteen of the Salvation Army in East Stroudsburg.
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The canteen provided soup and stew and drinks in Hemlock Farms, Pike County, to firefighters and emergency workers.
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Gueiss said he saw a funnel cloud in the distance as he headed from Monroe to Pike County.
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“We were scared to death,” he said. “There was this beautiful forest — and it looked like a field. It looked like somebody took a chain saw and cut off the tops of the trees.”
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The most popular people in the Blue Heron Lake community Tuesday were adjusters and power company workers.
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In one of the hardest-hit counties in Pennsylvania, few places in Pike County took the pummeling of Sunday night’s storm like Blue Heron Lake.
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At 8:30 p.m., Pennsylvania’s fastest-growing county become the fastest-blowing.
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The starting time is no mystery. Eight thirty remains stuck on Terry Palazzolo’s clock, the power still not restored Tuesday.
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“Some people say it sounded like a freight train,” the community caretaker said of the apparent tornado. “The color of the sky was what got me. It was awful. Eerie. I was born and raised in the mountains, and I was always told you didn’t have to worry about these things.”
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The damage from the apparent tornado, nine miles from the Monroe County border, was felt in homes 60 miles away in the Lehigh Valley.
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“My knees are just shaking at it,” said Whitehall Township resident Dolores Kotsch as she visited her second home at Blue Heron Lake.
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Her home fared well compared to the others.
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So did the Blue Heron home owned by Bethlehem resident George Steward. It lost shingles, sustained broken windows and lost a television antenna.
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Three heavy steel chairs were rearranged.
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“I can hardly lift this thing, and one is twisted like a piece of spaghetti,” Steward said. “I got very lucky. I stood on the deck by the Rohrbachs and I can’t believe they lived.”
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Donald and Bertha Rohrbach were inside their wood-frame home when the apparent tornado struck.
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They dove to the living room floor. A cabinet buried them. Donald Rohrbach was able to wrest himself free. He ran barefoot outside for help. He had scratches and bruises. His wife had scratches and bruises and injured a wrist and ankle. She was taken to Pocono Medical Center, but was not believed seriously hurt.
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The floor of their home was in the lake. Donald Rohrbach’s mounted moose head was on one side of the front yard. The antlers were on the other, near bureau drawers and a family portrait.
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And while many residents were away when the storm hit, they were there Tuesday: the sons revving up chain saws to clear a path for elderly residents, the neighbors offering soup, the residents with the cameras for pictures to give to the adjuster and the others with video cameras to record a moment for posterity.
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At least a dozen homes were damaged, the storm hitting some houses and leap-frogging others next door.
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“I was disoriented when I looked at this,” said Wuesthoff, who estimated the damage to be in the six figures. “Where the heck is the driveway?”
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As residents looked at what used to be their homes, an unsettling breeze blew. The power hadn’t been restored, and already there was another tornado watch.
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//The Morning Call, June 3, 1998//

====Salvation Army Volunteers Return Changed From WTC====
They saw the mangled rubble and cruel procession of body bags carried to a makeshift morgue.
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They ran when sirens cried that buckled buildings might crash down around them.
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And they tried to ease the weary frustration worn on the face of every rescuer.
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The grim scene of the World Trade Center's twisted metal is forever etched in the memories of two local men.
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[[Mark Mackneer|Major Mark Mackneer]] and Robert Gueiss arrived in New York City with other Salvation Army volunteers just hours after the towers collapsed.
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They spent more than two days giving warm smiles and hot meals to rescue workers amid a ruthless atmosphere of death and destruction.
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"I've seen some bad things — auto accidents, children dying in fires — but this was devastating," said Gueiss, emergency disaster coordinator for the Salvation Army in East Stroudsburg.
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The crew was escorted "right to the ground zero area" the night after the terror attacks.
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"We didn't really serve a lot of people the first night," said Mackneer, who marveled at the waves of uniformed workers filing past the canteen.
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On Wednesday, the canteen was moved to One Liberty Plaza. They were within a block of the wreckage and next to a temporary morgue.
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"We worked our tails off," said Mackneer.
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They served more than 3,500 rescuers who, tired of eating sandwiches, were happy to get some beef stew or chicken.
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Mackneer and Gueiss fled their station more than five times when surrounding buildings threatened to collapse.
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Gueiss hesitated the first time, wanting to keep an eye on the canteen.
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"It's fearful," said Mackneer. "We just dropped everything and ran. You've seen the pictures of people running in terror. It hits home when your right in the middle of it and you're the one who's running."
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The mass destruction far surpasses anything Mackneer has seen — even the wrecked homes and lives he witnessed after Hurricane Andrew slammed Homestead, Fla.
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"It just looks like a massive bomb went off," said Mackneer.
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Just as bad was the exhaustion of rescuers.
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"They were just totally worn out emotionally," he said. "Most of them are going to need some serious debriefing. They'll need to talk through the things they've seen."
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Mackneer heard many rescuers — including firefighters — encouraging each other saying "Come on, you really need something to eat."
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"Those firemen were so determined even though they could hardly walk," said Mackneer.
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He and Gueiss worked amid a steady roar of "humongous cranes," generators and trucks.
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Gueiss will never forget the "fire trucks torn apart" and scattered shoes of victims littering the street.
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And the pervasive white dust — 110 stories of pulverized concrete.
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"Our shoes were white," said Mackneer, who came home with the grime covering his dress uniform trousers.
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Their canteen is restocked and the pair is on call to return to the city when needed.
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Both men said the experience has changed them — taught them how to better handle the next disaster they're called to and shocked them.
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"I see what man can do. I see the wickedness that is in people if it's taken to an extreme. As it unfolds in my mind, I see the hurt and pain that people can cause one another all because of a lie," said Mackneer.
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//The Pocono Record, September 18, 2001//

====Obituary====
Robert E. Gueiss, 80, of Cresco, died Tuesday evening, September 20, 2016, at Whitestone Care Center in Stroud Township. He was the husband of Lucy L. (Counterman) Gueiss with whom he celebrated their 45th wedding anniversary in March 2016.
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Born on September 5, 1936 in East Stroudsburg, he was a son of the late John L. Sr. and Ruth (Flemming) Gueiss and was a lifetime resident of Monroe County.
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He served in the United States Marine Corps.
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Bob held many work positions including Shaw Plastics, Olympic, taxi driver for Pocono Cab, Paper Mill, Supradur, Halterman's, Pocono Record and janitor at The Salvation Army in East Stroudsburg from where he retired in 2007.
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He dedicated himself to helping others, was a retired emergency disaster coordinator for the Salvation Army in East Stroudsburg and was the first Salvation Army Canteen on the scene at 9/11. He was an honorary member and former chaplain of Acme Hose Company #1 in East Stroudsburg; and member of The Salvation Army in East Stroudsburg where he served as Jr. Soldier Sergeant, bus driver, attended the men's club and Bible studies, sang in the choir and was a cub scout leader.
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In addition to his wife, he is survived by two daughters, Tracie Tauber, wife of the late Sam Tauber of Cresco, and Heather Cleveland and her husband, William of Cresco; two granddaughters who he cherished, Catherine "Katie" and Kiana Cleveland both of Cresco; a great granddaughter, Aryana Michelle; a sister, Shirley Wright of East Stroudsburg and several nieces and nephews and great nieces and great nephews. He was preceded in death by brothers, John L. Gueiss, Jr., Donald B. Gueiss and Jimmy Gueiss; and sisters, Dorothy Gueiss and Lida Bensley.
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Viewing will begin at 11:00AM followed by the funeral service at 1:00PM on Wednesday, September 28, at The Salvation Army, 226 Washington Street, East Stroudsburg. Majors [[James Gingrich]] and [[Mary Francis]] will officiate. Private cremation will follow the service.
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In lieu of flowers, memorial remembrances may be made to The East Stroudsburg Salvation Army E.D.S. Program at the above address.

====External====
  * [[https://www.poconorecord.com/story/news/1998/05/27/salvation-army-s-bearer-salvation/51105362007/|Salvation Army's Bearer Of Salvation Wins Award]]
  * [[https://www.wmhclarkfuneralhome.com/obituary/3893420|Robert E. Gueiss]]
  * [[https://www.mcall.com/1998/06/03/community-is-in-shock-in-storms-wake-valley-residents-lost-weekend-homes-in-pike-county-to-apparent-tornado/|Community Is In Shock In Storm's Wake; Valley Residents Lost Weekend Homes In Pike County To Apparent Tornado]]
  * [[https://www.poconorecord.com/story/news/2001/09/18/salvation-army-volunteers-return-changed/51075172007/|Salvation Army Volunteers Return Changed From WTC]]