War Memorial Wall offers time to remember, reflect

Jack Rogers, the late Gazette editor, told poignant stories about receiving word of a local serviceman killed in Vietnam, then knocking on the doors of survivors to obtain a picture of the deceased. It was a difficult but necessary job, part of a newspaper's duty to tell the truth as well as honor those who gave their lives in service to their country.

Thankfully, it's not a task that has not been repeated that many times since the end of that war.

A friend from out of town, upon hearing that a traveling Vietnam Wall was visiting McCook, told us to be prepared to be deluged with stories and recollections from that era. He was right.

Thousands of stories from World War II are being lost each day as members of "the greatest generation" pass on, but neither should Vietnam-era stories be taken for granted. Some accounts list the first known Vietnam casualty as Richard B. Fitzgibbon of North Weymouth, Massachusetts, who is listed by the U.S. Department of Defense as having been killed on June 8, 1956. His son, Marine Lance Cpl. Richard B. Fitzgibbon III, was killed on Sept. 7, 1965.

Another Massachusetts man, Cpl. Charles McMahon, was one of the last two killed in Vietnam, both Marines. He and Lance Cpl. Darwin Judge from Marshalltown, Iowa, were killed in a rocket attack one day before the fall of Saigon in 1975.

McMahon was 11 days short of his 22nd birthday. Judge was an Eagle Scout and 19 years old.

There are three sets of fathers and sons on the Wall.

39,996 on the Wall were just 22 or younger.

8,283 were just 19 years old.

The largest age group, 33,103 were 18 years old.

12 soldiers on the Wall were 17 years old.

5 soldiers on the Wall were 16 years old.

One soldier, PFC Dan Bullock was 15 years old.

997 soldiers were killed on their first day in Vietnam.

1,448 soldiers were killed on their last day in Vietnam.

31 sets of brothers are on the Wall.

Thirty one sets of parents lost two of their sons.

54 soldiers attended Thomas Edison High School in Philadelphia.

Eight Women are on the Wall, nursing the wounded.

244 soldiers were awarded the Medal of Honor during the Vietnam War;

153 of them are on the Wall.

Beallsville, Ohio with a population of 475 lost six of her sons.

West Virginia had the highest casualty rate per capita in the nation.

There are 711 West Virginians on the Wall.

No doubt we will receive emails and calls disputing some of the points listed above, which we received from a reader in response to our coverage of the visit of the traveling Vietnam War Memorial Wall this weekend. If we do, it only goes to illustrate the controversial nature of that conflict.

While we've attempted to make amends for the way Vietnam veterans were treated upon their return, the conflict nearly tore our nation apart and the wounds are far from being healed.

We hope our readers take time to visit the Wall display at Weiland Field this weekend -- it closes at 3 p.m. Sunday -- and take time to meditate and reflect on the sacrifices it represents.