Page 9 - AV Wall 2019 - 10 Year Anniversary Program

AV WAll — 10 YeArs of BriNgiNg PeoPle TogeTher
AV Wall —
“A Purple Heart”: Founding AV Wall Member Remembers
November 2019 9 avwall.org
Courtesy photographs
by Linda Willis
Founding AV Wall Committee Member
The Mobile Vietnam Memorial Wall — The AV Wall — has a “magic” about it that happens every time it come out of its trailer and goes up on display.
The first “magic” happens as the 72 individual panels appear and are put into place in the support base, thus creating the Wall of the 58,276 names of men and women who served in the Vietnam War. The names of those who gave their lives, along with those who remain missing in action, are inscribed in the order they were taken from us. It gets me every time!
After 10 years of traveling with the AV Wall and meeting thousands of visitors, I am still amazed by the “magic” the Wall has. Visitors have experienced healing, joy, sadness, an education and more. Vietnam vet- erans, their families and others have come to pay their respects to the fallen
and missing, veterans’ wives have ac- companied their hesitant husbands to visit the Wall. Mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, wives, siblings and cousins have all visited their lost loved ones at the AV Wall. So many memories!
One such memory happened this way: It was the last night of a display many years ago ... It was cold and late, and having not stopped to eat all day, the AV Wall volunteers finally sat down together to eat a nice warm dinner that was donated to us. Because we always greet our visitors and ask them if they need assistance finding a name, I sat- down with a clear view of the entrance to the venue in case a visitor came in. As you may have already guessed, just as I began eat, an older woman came in by herself. She stopped at the corner of the Wall as she came in and looked at the panel ... reading line by line. This went on for a couple of minutes and by the time she was 2-3 panels up the East side of the Wall I decided it was time to
assist her. Well, we had just two volun- teers there that night and one of them offered to go out to the Wall and assist her so the group could finish eating. It turns out that the woman’s husband was killed in Vietnam and she was looking for his name! She had never been to a Vietnam Memorial Wall, so for the first time in nearly 50 years, here she was. Our volunteer found his name in our database of names and assisted the woman in locating it on the Wall and then left her alone to be with her grief. Later that evening we found a very small triangular piece of paper that had been torn from the flap of an envelope laid on the ledge of the base in front of the panel his name is listed on, it read “I (Heart, it was an actual heart shape) You Forever” written in purple.
There are many, many more stories of the “magic” of the Wall that I could share but, not here. Come and find me when you visit this year and I will be happy to share.
JOURNAL OF AEROSPACE, DEFENSE INDUSTRY AND VETERANS NEWS
a proud supporter of
www.aerotechnews.com
facebook.com/AerotechNewsandReview
6.5” AD SPACE