Of Memorials & Another War

The Philadelphia Vietnam Veterans Memorial was dedicated 20 years ago tomorrow. This is a bittersweet anniversary because while I was a player in the grassroots effort to get the memorial built, it exists because of the tragic loss of an extraordinary 646 men and boys from the city in that unpopular war.

The 1982 dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington -- the searing "V" designed by Maya Lin that initially was so controversial and is now the single most visited site in the capital -- was an enormous leap forward from the accumulated national guilt over the war and a fitting way for us to finally recognize the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice in the Big Muddy.

This is turn led to the construction of city and state Viet vet memorials, including the Philadelphia memorial at Penns Landing, where William Penn arrived in 1683 to found the place that today is inaptly named the City of Brotherly Love. The dedication of the memorial was an enormous catharsis for the families of those 646 men and boys and for a city that was and remains a crazy quilt of neighborhoods that gave of their own well beyond the call of duty during those dark days.

The Philadelphia memorial is hallowed ground, and after a few minutes there a visitor forgets that it is built over eight-lane Interstate 95.

Like the Washington memorial, the panels with the inscribed names of the departed are of black granite from the same Minnesota quarry. But unlike the Washington memorial, whose supporters successfully resisted efforts to dilute Lin's design with combat statuary, the Philadelphia memorial is fettered with panels of scenes that celebrate the war.

That, in my humble opinion, detracts from the memorial foundation's motto -- It Is Our Duty to Remember -- because it is the men and boys whom we should remember, cherish and celebrate, and not the awful war that took their lives.