Vietnam Memorial Traveling Walls Bring Comfort to Local Communities

For those who cannot travel to Washington D.C. to visit the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall, a moving replica can come to them. Four Vietnam Memorial Traveling Walls traverse the country. Each displays the names of 58,300 servicemen and women who died in the war, spreading the D.C. Wall’s healing legacy to millions.

Recent Destination

In late June, on a stop in Parma, Ohio, hundreds of motorcycle riders from Rolling Thunder, Inc. escorted one traveling display, this one dubbed “The Wall that Heals,” to Cuyahoga Community College. Assembled with LED lighting, the memorial could be visited round-the-clock for four days before moving on to the next host site.

One vet traveled from Chicago to the Parma exhibit to find the name of a town native he had served with on the Wall. He told Cleveland Fox News “About two or three years ago I started thinking about this and started to realize that the only reason I’m here is because (he) took my place that night.” Like the original Memorial, “The Wall that Heals” is erected in a chevron-shape and visitors can do name rubbings of individual service member’s names that are etched onto its surface. It is three-quarters the size of the permanent Vietnam Memorial Wall in D.C.

Credit:focus newspaper.com

Future Destinations

The mobile “Wall that Heals” will make its way through Massachusetts and Maine this month and then move on to the New York Hudson River Valley in early August. The full 2018 schedule of stops is available on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund website. Communities willing to enlist the help of local volunteers, can apply to host the replica Wall and mobile Education Center in the future.

Besides providing physical accessibility, Vietnam Memorial Traveling Walls allow the memory of the veterans enshrined on the D.C. Memorial to exist once more among family and friends in the peace and comfort of familiar surroundings. The traveling exhibit also provides thousands of veterans unable to visit or cope with the prospect of facing the D.C. Wall, to find the strength and courage to do so within their own communities, thus allowing the healing process to begin.