CROTHERSVILLE

While gathering for a family photo with Santa Claus, Missi Clouse was oblivious of what was about to happen.

A person wearing a Fire Pup costume was in the photo and then was asked to step aside.

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Then the head was taken off of the costume, and Clouse looked over and realized it was her daughter, Peyton Campbell, who is serving in the U.S. Navy.

Clouse screamed, excitedly ran over to her daughter and gave her a hug. Other surprised family members followed suit.

The only person who knew it was going to happen was Campbell’s father, Brian Clouse.

“I was totally excited,” Missi said of the big reveal Dec. 15 at the Crothersville-Vernon Township Volunteer Fire Department.

“He’s not really good at keeping secrets from me, so I never would have thought he would have pulled it off,” she said of Brian. “To see her, just excitement. I get to spend Christmas morning with her. It’s amazing.”

Campbell, 20, left the area before Christmas last year, but she will be around until the day after the holiday this year.

“Brian and I, we’ve been together a long time,” Missi said. “At one point in time, we lost a child and had to bury a child, and as they’ve grown, they are going their own ways and living their own lives, and I’ve always been mom, so it’s really hard watching them grow up. Even as a grownup, for her to be home Christmas morning, it means everything.”

In September, Campbell realized she would get to come home for two weeks from San Diego, California, to see her family.

At the beginning of November while talking to her father, she said she wanted to surprise the family but didn’t know how to do it.

When Brian realized her plane would arrive the day of Crothersville’s Christmas parade, he thought she could ride on a firetruck with Santa and surprise Missi.

Then after talking to Teia Thomas, a Crothersville Parks Board member who helped organize the Christmas event, they decided to use the fire department’s Fire Pup costume.

It was then a matter of keeping Campbell’s homecoming a surprise.

“I didn’t sleep but about four hours over the course of like two and a half days, so not a whole lot until then,” Brian said. “When I got up (Dec. 15), I was like, ‘Man, all we’ve got to do is keep it a few more hours.’”

The night before, Missi’s mother, Teresa Shepherd, said she became suspicious when Campbell told her on FaceTime that she was at an airport to say goodbye to a friend that was leaving.

“That got my wheels going,” Shepherd said.

During the Christmas parade, Shepherd said she saw Fire Pup on the firetruck, and based on the height, she was sure it was Campbell. She asked a couple of friends, but they both said it wasn’t her.

Then Missi’s sister-in-law, Brandy Browning, saw the smile through the screen mask on the dog’s face and knew who was in the costume.

“She has an unforgettable smile, so whenever she saw the smile, she was like, ‘That is Peyton,’” Shepherd said.

Shortly after, that was confirmed at the fire department.

“I was just shaking. I was so nervous,” Campbell said. “I tried to look at everybody at once, but it was so hard. All I saw was my mom running.”

It was a happy moment for all of the family.

“I was in tears, like bawling tears,” Browning said. “We are extremely close as a family. We do everything together. Now, we have all of our kids home, and we get to do one big family Christmas, which it has been a long time since we’ve been able to do that. It has been about seven years since all of the kids have been together.”

Brian said he was glad he was able to keep the secret.

“I was excited,” he said. “It was a thrill. It was pretty neat. Mom had no idea, which was the main goal.”

The family plans to gather Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Campbell said she looks forward to a good home-cooked meal instead of food like dehydrated turkey and ice cream she gets in the military. The family also plans to make cookies and ornaments and watch movies together.

Campbell said she was drawn to join the military when she was a freshman at Hauser High School in Hope.

“High school is when it kind of piqued my interest,” she said. “I was just like, ‘Oh, it seems kind of cool. I could travel the world.’”

The decision became final when she attended a Veterans Day program at school her junior year.

“I was watching this video up on the screen, and I was watching those interviews, and I was like, ‘That’s it. That’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to serve my country,’” she said. “That’s all I cared about was making myself a better person, and then I wanted to do something for my country. Even though people didn’t know what I was doing, I wanted to make a difference somehow.”

Initially, she thought about joining the U.S. Army infantry so she could be on the front lines. When she talked to Navy recruiters, however, she changed her mind.

They gave her a list of jobs she could do, and it took her about two months to decide she wanted to be an aviation ordnanceman.

“We build bombs, missiles, torpedoes, rockets and ammo for all of the guns on the ship,” Campbell said.

After going through boot camp in Great Lakes, Illinois, she was based at Naval Air Station North Island in San Diego, serving on the USS Carl Vinson.

This year, she was deployed to Guam, the Philippines and Vietnam in January and Hawaii in July.

“I’ve learned a lot,” she said. “I’ve met a lot of people. I’ve learned different cultures, especially in Vietnam. Vietnam was really nice. Learning different cultures is nice. I’ve learned a lot about my job.”

Next year, she said she will be dry-docked in Washington for a while before going on a 10-month deployment to Dubai, Bahrain and possibly Australia.

During that time, she also wants to begin college, which the Navy will cover the costs.

Campbell said she has four years left on an active duty contract. After that, she said she probably will re-enlist and look for shore duty closer to home.

Her family is proud of her service to the country.

“The pride is overwhelming,” Shepherd said. “It is such a great pride just to know that she’s in the military.”

Missi said she and her brother, Matt Browning, grew up military.

“For the longest time, that was the lifestyle that we knew,” she said. “We have a lot of respect for anybody that puts on a uniform.”

Brian said his father served in Vietnam, and Brandy also has a military background in her family.

“All of our kids have been, from Day 1, you take the utmost respect and you show your pride to anyone that’s out there fighting,” Brandy said. “Now, (Campbell) is a part of it. Jaylyn (Brandy and Matt’s daughter), days before came home, she was really sad. She wanted her cousin to be home for Christmas this year, so it was a huge deal for her whenever she saw her.”

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To view a video of the surprise homecoming of Airman E-3 Peyton Campbell, visit the Crothersville Community Park Facebook page.

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