Rochester, New York, Chapter 20 and the Veterans Outreach Center of Rochester sponsored a 9/11 “Operation We Remember” ceremony on September 11 at the city’s War on Terror Memorial at Highland Park. The chapter Color Guard presented and retired the colors at the ceremony and chapter Director Tom Puff gave the Invocation.

Northern Virginia Dean K. Phillips Memorial Chapter 227 celebrated its 39th anniversary at the monthly membership meeting in October. The guest speaker, retired 4-star Army Gen. David M. Rodriguez, served on active duty from 1976-2016, and was the Commanding General of the Army Forces Command in Afghanistan, among many other assignments. St. Augustine, Florida, Leo C. Chase, Jr., Chapter 1084 celebrated its 10th anniversary at its September membership meeting.

Members of Santa Ana, California, Chapter 1024 took part in a press conference October 3, after the U.S. House of Representatives approved Rep. Michelle Steel’s (R-Calif.) proposal to rename the Little Saigon U.S. Post Office in Westminster the Little Saigon Vietnam Veterans Memorial Post Office, an effort the chapter had lobbied for. On hand for the occasion were chapter Vice President Bob Harrison, President Dennis Phelps, Rep. Steel, Chapter Secretary Frank Barry, and helicopter pilot John Harris. “The name of the post office will be a reminder of the bravery and sacrifice that veterans made and that freedom is not free,” Barry said. “Our hope is that it will inspire future generations to express gratitude to all veterans in service to our country.”

Photo Courtesy Frank Barry

Alexandria, Louisiana, Chapter 1132, in conjunction with the City of Pineville, La., held a memorial service August 23, honoring Pineville High School graduate R.V. Edwards, who was killed in action in Quang Tri Province in South Vietnam that day in 1966, while serving as a machine gunner with the 2nd Battalion of the 3rd Marine Division. Members of Edwards’ family, chapter members, and representatives of other local veterans groups attended the ceremony. The city presented a plaque to the family commemorating his service and Chapter 1132 donated a bible to the family in Edwards’ memory.

When members of Toledo, Ohio, Chapter 35 recently discovered that the headstone of Arthur Heringhousen, Jr., at a local cemetery was neglected and caked with mold and mildew, chapter life member Lenny Fetterman took action. He voluntarily did a deep clean on the headstone that restored the lettering. Heringhousen, who served as a LRRP with Company F of the 101st Airborne Division’s 58th Infantry Regiment, was killed in action in Thua Thiên Province in northern South Vietnam on November 20, 1968.

Denver, Colorado, Chapter 1071 is working with the local Lakewood Elks Lodge’s Veterans in Need Program, which supplies personal items to veterans formerly living in unhealthy and dangerous circumstances. Most are former servicemembers who have recently moved into low-cost apartments in Lakewood after being treated and evaluated by the VA. Some 90 veterans are currently in the program at four subsidized apartment units. The chapter collects bulk quantities of new socks, tee shirts, shorts, and briefs and the Elks Lodge stores and then delivers the items to the veterans. The chapter also distributes donated mattresses and box springs, as well as couches, chests of drawers, and bookshelves to veterans in need.

The Georgia State Council recently endorsed Greater Metro-Atlanta Chapter 1118’s Sons of Atlanta Vietnam War Memorial Project’s Commemorative Brick-A-Thon. The project will support the effort to construct the memorial, which will honor and memorialize the more than 240 servicemembers from Atlanta and eight other cities in Fulton County, Georgia, who lost their lives in the Vietnam War or who died while serving in the U. S. military during the war. Ground is scheduled to be broken next Memorial Day for the Sons of Atlanta Vietnam War Memorial Plaza in that city’s Historic Piedmont Park. The memorial will contain 12,000 slots for engraved commemorative bricks as part of its foundation. For more info, and to purchase a brick during the Brick-A-Thon, ending December 31, go to www.sonsofatlanta.org

Liberty County, Georgia, Chapter 789 sponsored the October 24-27 visit of The Wall That Heals Vietnam Veterans Memorial replica to Hinesville, Georgia. Chapter President Dennis Fitzgerald and chapter AVVA President were instrumental in arranging the event, which also included a display of photographs of local servicemembers whose names are on The Wall, a display of items left at the Memorial in Washington, D.C., and a talk to local students by Callie Wright, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund’s Education Director.

Photo Courtesy Frank Barry

Central Coast Chapter 982 in Guadalupe, California, held a rededication ceremony on September 21 of the Guadalupe Veterans Memorial at the city’s Veterans Plaza. The memorial, which honors three local men—Michael Peter Pagaling, Phillip Hernandez, and Arturo Carrasco—who lost their lives in the Vietnam War, had been moved to its current site in 2023. “We grew up together,” chapter President Richard “Deek” Segovia, said at the rededication, and “growing up in Guadalupe in a small community, we were all family. It just fills my heart to be able to give a final resting place where it belongs to them.”

The Oregon State Vietnam Veterans Memorial was first proposed for the State Capitol Grounds by Salem Chapter 271 in 2015. Groundbreaking for the $5.5-million memorial took place on Vietnam War Veterans Day, March 29, and the dedication ceremonies for Phase I of the project came on November 24. Portland, Oregon, Chapter 392 has made several donations totaling more than $100,000 to the memorial. The chapter also recently donated $85,000 to help fund a statue by Portland-area sculptor Libby Carruth that will be an important part of the Memorial. The chapter “will long be remembered as Vietnam veterans, and what we stood for,” chapter President Steve Carr said of its support for the memorial and statue. “All those who [see] the sculpture will have a remembrance of us, and our homecoming. Walking toward the statue, you see the back of a veteran with his duffle bag coming home. After entering the memorial, you’ll see the front of the soldier, with the [American] flag in the background.”

2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010