Visiting the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington

[+ WilliamM]

Especially at Christmas 

[+ purplekow]

Not sure if everyone is overcome with sadness when visiting this memorial but I am sure that everyone of a certain age is.   Such a waste of young lives.  

[Rudynate]

It can't help but effect one.

[+ WilliamM]

1 hour ago, purplekow said:

Not sure if everyone is overcome with sadness when visiting this memorial but I am sure that everyone of a certain age is.   Such a waste of young lives.  

My friend  whose name is on the Vietnam  veterans Wall  knew exactly what he was doing. His mame was Steven Ramsey. I didn't  always agree.  

I was in a. Light Infantry  brigade in Viet Nam in  1968 and 1969

 

 

[MikeBiDude]

I recently visited the Vietnam War Museum in Ho Chi Minh City. Very sobering and sad….and of course told from the Vietnamese point of view.

[+ WilliamM]

Thank you, . Mike

Greatly,  Appreciate 

[marylander1940]

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

[edit]

 

In 1981, at 21 and still an undergraduate student, Lin won a public design competition to design the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, to be built on the National Mall in Washington D.C. Her design, one of 1,422 submissions,^[15] specified a black granite wall with the names of 57,939 fallen soldiers carved into its face (hundreds more have been added since the dedication),^[16][17] to be v-shaped, with one side pointing toward the Lincoln Memorial and the other toward the Washington Monument.^[16] The memorial was designed in the minimalist architectural style, which was in contrast to previous war memorials.^[2] The memorial was completed in late October 1982 and dedicated in November 1982.^[18]

According to Lin, her intention was to create an opening or a wound in the earth to symbolize the pain caused by the war and its many casualties. "I imagined taking a knife and cutting into the earth, opening it up, and with the passage of time, that initial violence and pain would heal," she recalled.^[19]

Her winning design was initially controversial for several reasons: its minimalist design,^[20] her lack of professional experience, and her Asian ethnicity.^[8][21][22] Some objected to the exclusion of the surviving veterans' names, while others complained about the dark complexion of the granite, claiming that it expressed a negative attitude towards the Vietnam War. Lin defended her design before the US Congress, and a compromise was reached: Three Soldiers, a bronze depiction of a group of soldiers and an American flag were placed to the side of Lin's design.^[12]

Notwithstanding the initial controversy, the memorial has become an important pilgrimage site for relatives and friends of the dead soldiers, many of whom leave personal tokens and mementos in memory of their loved ones.^[23][24] In 2007, an American Institute of Architects poll ranked the memorial No. 10 on a list of America's Favorite Architecture, and it is now one of the most visited sites on the National Mall.^[12] Furthermore, it now serves as a memorial for the veterans of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars.^[12] There is a collection with items left since 2001 from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, which includes handwritten letters and notes of those who lost loved ones during these wars. There is also a pair of combat boots and a note with it dedicated to the veterans of the Vietnam War, that reads "If your generation of Marines had not come home to jeers, insults, and protests, my generation would not come home to thanks, handshakes and hugs."^[12]

Lin once said that if the competition had not been held "blind" (with designs submitted by name instead of number), she "never would have won" on account of her ethnicity. Her assertion is supported by the fact that she was harassed after her ethnicity was revealed, as when prominent businessman and later third-party presidential candidate Ross Perot called her an "egg roll."^[25]

[+ WilliamM]

I visited the Vietnam memorial on  January 1 st of  the  first year it was open to public.   Memorial because  relatives and friends  finally had their say.

 

They brought  Christmas gifts and  cards to  where the loved are mentioned.

 

 

 

Amazing experience 

[+ WilliamM]

I.was the first Vietnam vet to take a course on the literature.and films of  literature of the Vietnam.war. at the University'  of Pennsylvania

 

[+ WilliamM]

23 hours ago, purplekow said:

Not sure if everyone is overcome with sadness when visiting this memorial but I am sure that everyone of a certain age is.   Such a waste of young lives.  

I already knew how many days I had left in Vietnam 

Respectfully to My critic who never left the United States during the Vietnam war ,  interesting responses 

[+ purplekow]

6 hours ago, WilliamM said:

I already knew how many days I had left in Vietnam 

Respectfully to My critic who never left the United States during the Vietnam war ,  interesting responses 

I am quoted here and I am not a critic.  I think all those young lives in that war and the wars before and since have been lost in a wasteful manner.  I am not saying their efforts were not appreciated, just that the loss of life was a wasteful shame, especially looking back.  Two of my neighbors are on the wall.  I was too young to serve in Viet Nam but I think I would have gone if drafted, because that was the way I was brought up.  My number did not come up in the lottery, it was 362.   

[+ WilliamM]

18 hours ago, purplekow said:

I am quoted here and I am not a critic.  I think all those young lives in that war and the wars before and since have been lost in a wasteful manner.  I am not saying their efforts were not appreciated, just that the loss of life was a wasteful shame, especially looking back.  Two of my neighbors are on the wall.  I was too young to serve in Viet Nam but I think I would have gone if drafted, because that was the way I was brought up.  My number did not come up in the lottery, it was 362. 

I  was  drafted 

[Luv2play]

I thought it was a brilliant design the first time I saw a picture of it. It has proven its rightful place amongst the monuments of Washington where there is no shortage of impressive monuments. 
 

Around the time that monument was installed the AIDs crisis was unfolding. It wiped out a similar number of young men of the next generation after the Vietnam War vets. 
 

If you are ever in Toronto there is a small downtown park in the Gay Village which has a similarly stark memorial to the AIDs victims. The names are mounted on metal plaques on pillars, one pillar for each year of the crisis.

Although it is a Toronto memorial the names are of men from everywhere in Canada. I have several friends whose names are inscribed and I try to visit every time I am there. Just to run my fingers over their names and to remember them. 

[+ BobPS]

I went once about 30 years ago on an appropriately cold, dreary  Saturday in February.  I found my first cousins name and the name of a young man  I knew who went to my high school but was several years ahead of me. My first cousin died in Vietnam on October 31, 1970. It is a very moving experience, especially if you had family or friends who died in Vietnam. It is well worth visiting at least once.

Edited November 14, 2024 by BobPS
Grammar

[+ Charlie]

The Vietnam War had an unusual effect on my family. My uncle moved to Saigon to work for the US military in Saigon during the war. He moved his wife and children from Michigan to Hawaii so he would be closer to them for R&R visits. However, in Saigon he met a young Vietnamese woman, and he left his wife and children for her. When the war ended he moved her and her entire immediate family  to Texas, where they all lived together for the rest of his life. He was also estranged from our whole family for the rest of his life.

[Luv2play]

6 hours ago, Charlie said:

The Vietnam War had an unusual effect on my family. My uncle moved to Saigon to work for the US military in Saigon during the war. He moved his wife and children from Michigan to Hawaii so he would be closer to them for R&R visits. However, in Saigon he met a young Vietnamese woman, and he left his wife and children for her. When the war ended he moved her and her entire immediate family  to Texas, where they all lived together for the rest of his life. He was also estranged from our whole family for the rest of his life.

Did your uncle have a second family with his Vietnamese wife? 

[+ Charlie]

3 minutes ago, Luv2play said:

Did your uncle have a second family with his Vietnamese wife? 

No, he did not. His daughter eventually attempted a reconciliation with her father after her mother and both of her brothers had died, but the Vietnamese wife obstructed it.

[+ WilliamM]

Sadly,  not unusual 

[+ Charlie]

The Vietnamese wife seemed determined to prevent him from having any contact, not only with his ex-wife and children, but even with his mother and four siblings. He lived to be 91, but none of them except the persistent daughter ever saw him again, and she only saw him once. I imagine that the Vietnamese wife felt very insecure in America, especially in the early days when she and her own family were completely dependent on him.

[marylander1940]

 

[+ WilliamM]

.I was a chaplain's assistant in Vietnam. My   chaplain wanted  someone who wasn't too religious.

Someone who knew how to drive a Jeep and  order a helicopter And  was ok with   A priest having a girlfriend In New York 

[Old Blue]

I lost two fraternity brothers in Vietnam; both were Marines.  When I found their names on the Vietnam Memorial years later, I couldn’t hold back the tears.  My first impulse was to try to hide my face but then I realized almost everyone I had seen, at a minimum,  had tears in their eyes.  It’s a magnificently moving memorial.    

[Andy2]

I remember the controversy over the Lin design.  I for one found it a refreshing change from the stolid memorials that already dotted the Mall area, but veterans' groups were on the whole quite critical for the same feature. (Lin's ethnicity might also have played a role.)

Visiting the Memorial once a year (on average), it is my favorite.  I have been pleasantly surprised that veterans' groups as well as popular opinion have turned around almost 180 degrees. 

The war was a tragedy.  Those who died deserve to be remembered by name.  Bless the architect.  

[BSR]

6 hours ago, Andy2 said:

I remember the controversy over the Lin design.  I for one found it a refreshing change from the stolid memorials that already dotted the Mall area, but veterans' groups were on the whole quite critical for the same feature. (Lin's ethnicity might also have played a role.)

Visiting the Memorial once a year (on average), it is my favorite.  I have been pleasantly surprised that veterans' groups as well as popular opinion have turned around almost 180 degrees. 

The war was a tragedy.  Those who died deserve to be remembered by name.  Bless the architect.  

I love Lin's design because it is beautiful in its sadness, which (imo) perfectly captures our nation's feelings about that particular war.  While the Vietnam War Memorial design initially sparked much controversy, I was struck by its beauty when I first saw it.  Something can be stark and somber, yet beautiful.  I'm so glad to hear that the war's veterans and gold star families have come to embrace it.

Edited November 28, 2024 by BSR
Typo

[+ WilliamM]

As .uch as I enjoy reading about the memorial ,   This Vietnam vet remembers my friendfs who  survived lifke Jim  amd Dennis