The American public embraces the idea of establishing memorials to remember a person or an event. Town squares and city parks across the country are filled with tributes to citizens lost in wars dating back to the American Revolution. Often these monuments are representations of a soldier or a sailor or a general. More spontaneous, temporary memorials frequently spring up at the scene of a highway fatality or a school shooting, or at Union Square Park in New York City in the aftermath of September 11.
The word "memorial" is derived from the Latin term "memoria," meaning "mindful" or "remembering." There are three varieties of memory: genetic, collective and personal. The traditional purpose of a memorial is to help people unite both collective and personal memories. Today, because of the dynamic and immediate response people have had to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, we also expect emotional catharsis.
One of the most remarkable and poignant anti-war protests ever held took place Nov. 13-15, 1969. For the "March Against Death," thousands of people walked to the White House, and as each person stood in front of the gates, he or she shouted out either the name of an American serviceman or nurse who had been killed in Vietnam or the name of a village that had been destroyed there. At other demonstrations -- in New York, in Boston, in small towns across the nation -- the names of the American dead in the Vietnam War were read out to shame the government. In incorporating the roll call of names into the very structure of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, architect Maya Ying Lin managed to marry an anti-war protest technique with the desire of veterans to honor their comrades-in-arms.
"The Wall" was dedicated 20 years ago this past weekend. I did not attend that 1982 ceremony even though I had donated $60 to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund -- $20 in memory of each of the three young men I knew whose names would be among the 58,022 emblazoned on the black granite wall. Two of my best friends -- a wounded Vietnam veteran and the man I was then dating (another Vietnam veteran) -- planned to attend the dedication ceremony. They knew quite well my impassioned support of the memorial; they knew also of my long-standing opposition to the war in Vietnam, and of my work with returned Vietnam veterans and their families. Still, they asked me not to attend the dedication because I was not a Vietnam vet. I complied with their request and stayed home.
Twenty years later, I remain convinced that my opposition to the war was correct. I still work with Vietnam veterans, and I regard the Vietnam Veterans Memorial as a profoundly sacred public space where the living come to commune with the dead -- a place in which to think about sacrifice, honor, duty, country, war, peace and remembrance.
And now I live in Washington, D.C. So when the opportunity arose for me to participate in the 20th anniversary ceremonies at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, I volunteered to read names of the dead, which now number 58,229 (names were added as the date of the first American death in Vietnam changed, deaths outside the "war zone" were included and some men died from wounds suffered in Vietnam after they had returned to the United States). I filled out the paperwork, picking the date and the times most convenient for me; my instructions arrived toward the end of October, with details about the precise time I would read the list of "my" 30 names.
Last Sunday I arrived at the volunteers' tent on Bacon Drive two hours prior to when my reading was supposed to begin. I checked in with a Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund (VVMF) volunteer, who made certain I had my list of names. She offered me a plastic bag with some souvenirs and told me to check in at the reader's platform at the apex of the memorial in order to double-check timing. Then she asked if I had been a nurse in Vietnam. I said no, I had been an anti-war activist, and I pointed to the original Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) button I was wearing. The woman glanced at the pin and said, "Oh, you know a lot of the veterans joined the protests when they got home." I agreed with her, relieved that my tiny anti-war statement in the middle of an enormous outpouring of emotions for veterans did not offend. I thanked her for her assistance, took a bag of souvenirs and walked across Bacon Drive and toward the speaker's platform.
There were hundreds of people in the area, some walking down the incline toward the memorial, some standing around the statue of the three servicemen, others congregating near the Women's Memorial. Some people were seated in front of the speaker's platform, listening to the recital of names. Many others were gathering in groups, greeting one another like the long-lost friends they were. Every Marine greeted every other Marine with a call of "Semper Fi" or "Happy Birthday" (Nov. 10 is the birthday of the U.S. Marine Corps).
Another VVMF volunteer advised me that the readings were on schedule, and said that I needed to be in line 20 minutes before I was to read. That gave me an hour and a half to wander around the rest of the area with my partner, who had accompanied me. We stood and listened to some of the readers for a few minutes, and then we walked off in the direction of the Reflecting Pool. We strolled by the tents set up by Vietnam Veterans of America; we walked on and up to Constitution Avenue, stopping at the display presented by the Gold Star Wives of America Inc. We looked at the Helicopters Associations material. We walked past the permanent "tiger cage" and POW/MIA displays.
Then I walked back to the memorial alone and entered it from the east slope (the part that points toward the Washington Monument). I held a small piece of paper on which I had written eight names -- seven young men from my hometown and one young man I had known in college -- and the panel and line numbers where their names appear on the memorial. I went to each site, found the name I knew, stood facing each one and moved on.
And then it was time for me to get in line at the reader's platform. I found the same VVMF volunteer to whom I had spoken an hour and a half earlier. He double-checked the page number of "my" names and asked me to get in line. I was seventh in the queue. Another volunteer at the top of the stairs was giving instructions to the next reader. As we moved up in line, this volunteer triple-checked that we had the right page from which to read and asked us to walk and speak s-l-o-w-l-y, as the program was running ahead of schedule. I was next.
I walked to the podium, put my list down, took a deep breath and began to read, "Marvin Richard Berhowe." Then I counted to five. And I read. And counted to five. And read. And counted. Until I read "Brian Lewis Long." And then I picked up my list, turned, walked off the platform and joined my companion, who was sitting in front of the stage. The couple who had been behind me was now at the podium. The man started to read. Then he stopped, and the woman, his wife, announced the next name on the list as her brother, and she pronounced that name. Then her husband resumed reading. And then he stopped -- his voice strained and cracking -- and announced that he had served in Vietnam with the man whose name he would read next. He paused, and then resumed reading.
I signaled my companion that we should leave. And as we walked away, I said, "That's why I didn't want to read the names of anyone I knew. It was difficult enough just reading the list I had; I don't think I'd have been able to get through it without falling apart if I had to say any of the names of people I knew."
The reading of names took 65 hours. More than 2,000 volunteers were required, including readers, on-site personnel and those behind the scenes.
The memorial has now been in place for 20 years, and, as Harry W. Haines wrote in What Kind of War?: An Analysis of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, "The Memorial's profound meaning is not so much in how the dead are remembered by those of us who survived Vietnam at home or abroad, but in how that remembrance is used by power to explain -- to justify -- future sacrifices in future Vietnams."
Women and men, old and young, anti-war activists and veterans from many wars: all came together this Veterans Day weekend to remember -- not the "war to end all wars," not the "good war," but the veterans who brought us the icon of the black granite wall, which is there to remind us of the people and things that we lost. I hope this tradition continues as long as the wall stands. I do not think I will be around to participate in a 20th anniversary of a "reading of the names" from the coming war in Iraq, which could be just such a "future Vietnam."
Instead, I will leave you with a very personal reading of eight names, seven from Winthrop, Mass., and one from Marblehead, Mass.: Paul Frank Brugman (29E-27), John Cullin White (34E-61), Robert Winslow Belcher (49E-19), John Alden Countaway, Jr. (56E-37), Joseph Patrick Logan (63W-8), Joseph Michael Pignato (39W-29), Duncan Balfour Sleigh (39W-30) and Edmund Lambert MacNeil III (3W-22).
Ellen Pinzur is the office manager of the Prospect.
