A ceremony at the USS Olympia started Veterans Day with a bang.

Actually, a dozen bangs - from a pair of breech-loading six-pounder guns on a rainy deck.

"Fire in the hole!" yelled various attendees as they pulled a cord, triggering a loud blast and smoke.

"I loved it! . . . It was like the funnest thing I ever did," said Shakyla Ellis, 17, a Frankford High senior and four-year member of Junior ROTC.

The salute followed a solemn ceremonies held inside the ship, now docked at Penn's Landing, that carried the remains of America's first Unknown Soldier from France in 1921.

Fire Commissioner Lloyd Ayers, who served in the Coast Guard, rang the ship's bell and spoke about honoring the flag as well as veterans. State. Sen. Lawrence Farnese, a Philadelphia Democrat, said the push continues for a new Forever stamp to honor the 600,000 Americans awarded the Purple Heart.

The flag used in a folding ceremony once draped the coffin of the father of one of participants, Lt. Col. Gary Seifert, 71, a Philadelphian who served in the National Guard in the 1960s.

His dad, John, was in the Guard for fifty years after serving in World War II.

Another folder was Army Sgt. Charles Wetherbee, 76, who served in the late 1950s and who counts ancestors that fought in the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812 and the Spanish-American War - the conflict in which the Olympia first saw action.

The riverside observance was just one of many planned around the region.

Philadelphia Public Schools also are closed for the holiday.

Other events around the region were timed to begin at 11 a.m. in commemoration of the armistice that ended World War I at 11 a.m. on Nov. 11, 1918 - the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.

Unlike Memorial Day, which honors America's war dead and now falls on the last Monday in May, Veterans Day is always observed on Nov. 11.

Mayor Nutter was to deliver remarks at an 11 a.m. ceremony at the Eternal Flame in Washington Square Park, site of a mass grave from the Revolutionary War.

At Temple University, students were to assemble more than 100 care packages for U.S. troops in Afghanistan and write them letters of support.

At 6 p.m. the Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge, 1601 Valley Forge Rd., will hold a candlelight ceremony to honor veterans.

Near Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, officials were to dedicate new facilities at the Brig. Gen. William C. Doyle Veterans Cemetery at 11 a.m., and in Wildwood, Vietnam Veterans of America Chapter 955 planned a groundbreaking ceremony for a Vietnam Veterans Remembrance Wall for 12:30 p.m.

This evening, Air Force reservists from the joint base plan to serve dinner to homeless veterans at the Chosen 300 mission at 11th and Spring Garden Streets in Philadelphia.

Nearly two dozen Camden County College students who are veterans were to receive Camden County Veterans Medal to recognize their service. at a 12:30 p.m. ceremony at the college's Blackwood campus.

Contact staff writer Peter Mucha at 215-854-4342 or pmucha@phillynews.com.