Pages

Saturday, March 27, 2010

Vietnam veterans honored this weekend

If there are any Vietnam veterans thinking their service didn't matter this proves it did. Late in coming, that's for sure, but aside from what Vietnam veterans did when they came home, what they achieved for the sake of all veterans, there is one more really important thing they did. They taught this nation a lesson about the debt we owe to those we send to risk their lives. All veterans who came after did receive the respect and appreciation the Vietnam veterans did not receive because they refused to give up on the rest of us.

These are just a few of the events going on this weekend around the country.


Event to honor Vietnam veterans

Published: Saturday, March 27, 2010 2:38 AM CDT
YUCCA VALLEY — Morongo Basin residents will have the opportunity to thank and honor local Vietnam War veterans as the town hosts a “Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans” reception 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday in the Yucca Valley Community Center’s Yucca Room.

Similar tributes will be staged throughout the state Tuesday, following a state resolution signed into law last year designating March 30 for an annual recognition of Vietnam veterans in California.

The bill was authored by Assemblyman Paul Cook, R-Yucca Valley.

Another local Marine veteran, Carl Gorham, helped trigger the development of Cook’s Assembly bill. He met with Cook about the issue after observing a negative public reaction to Vietnam veterans in the Palm Springs Veterans Day parade a few years ago.
go here for more
Event to honor Vietnam veterans




Vietnam vets mark end of war with service in Lynn


By David Liscio / The Daily Item

LYNN - Tom Mailloux vividly recalls the day he got word that his teenage brother, John, had been killed in Vietnam.

"A priest and a police officer went to the West Lynn GE and told my mother. When they called you up to the front office in those days, you knew what it was about," he said Friday during a wreath-laying ceremony at City Hall to honor local residents who served during the Vietnam War.

It was Nov. 24, 1968.

"Kind of messed up Thanksgiving," said Mailloux, who attended the ceremony with his sister, Maureen Mailloux Hudson. "Over the years, my family never forgot because of us. They won't forget my brother and all the others who sacrificed."
read more here

Vietnam vets mark end of war with service in Lynn



Daughter led effort for state's Vietnam Veterans Day
By Meg Jones of the Journal Sentinel

Thuy Smith is proud of her father.

She understands that it wasn't easy for Bill Smith and hundreds of thousands of other veterans returning from Vietnam. Many did not receive warm welcomes home, not like veterans of World War II or Korea.

And Thuy Smith's father had an additional element to his homecoming: having found love in the war, he came home to rural Wisconsin with a wife and baby daughter from Vietnam.

Growing up, Thuy Smith felt isolated and found herself pushing away her Vietnamese heritage.

Then she began meeting Vietnam veterans who came to her mother's Vietnamese restaurant, Huong's Little Wok, in Hayward. They found a common thread stitching their pasts together. She shared with the veterans the same sense of lingering sadness, a feeling of not fitting in.

"The veterans told me that because I represented Vietnam for them, they could relate to me," said Smith, whose parents will celebrate their 39th wedding anniversary in May. "Coming together with others who understand and talking with them brought a lot of healing to me."

Now she's helping give back to Vietnam veterans such as her father, who served two extended tours in Vietnam, and the men she met at her mother's restaurant. Two years ago she learned of efforts to organize a Vietnam Veterans Day in Minnesota and Tennessee, and she thought Wisconsin also should recognize the day.
read more here

http://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/89312622.html



Vietnam Vets Day
Mar 26 2010 5:30PM
KXMBTV Bismarck
Honor Guard marches in

North Dakota becomes the 10th state to honor Vietnam Veteran's as Governor Hoeven proclaims March 29th Vietnam Veterans Day in North Dakota.

Close to 18-thousand North Dakotan's served in the Vietnam Warwith 198 making the ultimate sacrifice.

Soldiers today say they were never officially welcomed homeuntil now.

A touching moment came when Dan Stenvold of the Vietnam Veterans of America shared a story about his unit the 1-5-5.

read more of this here

http://www.kxnet.com/getArticle.asp?ArticleId=545760





No comments:

Post a Comment

If it is not helpful, do not be hurtful. Spam removed so do not try putting up free ad.