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TEXT & PHOTOS BY MARK JURY
With temperatures barely above
freezing in the early morning of November 11, Janet Gorman
King read her poem about nurses in Vietnam, “Hers Was
the Last Face He Saw.” King
read in front of the Vietnam Women’s Memorial in
Washington, D.C. The crowd attending the reading had come
to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the dedication of
the Memorial.
As the temperature rose and the warmth of
the day spread over the thousands of Vietnam veterans and
their supporters, the spirit of the motto of the Memorial—“A
Legacy of Healing and Hope”—also spread over
the crowd. A day of storytelling, speakers, and camaraderie
culminated with the Color Guard Pass in Review that was
developed and organized by VVA.
“Fifteen years ago we talked about leaving a legacy,” said
Diane Carlson Evans, an Army nurse in Vietnam, founder and
president of the board of the Vietnam Women’s Memorial
Foundation. “But what is that legacy: remembering,
honoring, and connecting with a new generation. I hear women
say, ‘If it wasn’t for the Memorial, I wouldn’t
be where I am today.’”
Throughout the day, every
visitor to the Women’s Memorial
was given a single rose to place on the statue. Sue Miller,
a Navy nurse in Vietnam who retired after 34 years in the
military, came up with the idea. “It’s just a
beautiful way to give people something they can take to the
statue and feel they’re a part of such a special group,” she
said. “You can lay a rose on the Memorial and say a
prayer.”
Jim and Mattie Laviana of VVA Chapter 12 in
East Hartford, Connecticut, have been coming to the Vietnam
Women’s
Memorial every year since the dedication. Jim, who was with
the 1st Aviation Battalion, said: “All the women veterans
I knew are not here now,” as he remembered a friend
who was a nurse in Cu Chi. Looking toward the rose-covered
Memorial, he mused: “There have been a lot of tears,
but now there’s rejoicing. Finally.”
Marsha Four,
an Army nurse in Vietnam and the long-time chair of the VVA
Women Veterans Committee, summed up the feelings of many
who visited Washington, D.C., on Veterans Day 2008. “When
I think about ‘the good old days’ as far as the
military is concerned,” she said, “I think about
that one year of my life I spent with people who were also
part of a very dramatic experience, one that will stay with
me until the day I die.”
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