Mobile Vietnam Memorial due to open Nov. 10
EL CENTRO – The city has announced the schedule of activities for the upcoming visit of the Mobile Vietnam Memorial Wall at Bucklin Park Nov. 10-15.
The memorial’s appearance was arranged through the efforts of VFW Post 9305 in El Centro with the project led by post member and Vietnam veteran Thomas Henderson, a city press release stated.
The half-scale tribute to the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C., will be open continuously from 3 p.m. Nov. 10 to 8 a.m. Nov. 15. It will have 24-hour security. The park is located at 1350 S. Eighth St.
The events begin at 8:30 a.m. on Nov. 10 with the El Centro schools procession followed by an official opening ceremony at 6 p.m.
On Nov. 11 there will be a Veterans Day ceremony at 11 a.m. On Nov. 13 there will be a candlelight procession with Customs and Border Patrol bagpipes at 7 p.m. followed by a reading of the names of the fallen at 7:30. A Vietnam veterans’ recognition ceremony will be held Nov. 14 at 3 p.m.
The mobile memorial is engraved with more than 58,200 service members who were killed in Vietnam from Nov. 1, 1955 until May 15, 1975. It is cared for by Point Man Antelope Valley, a veterans’ outreach organization that ministers to veterans of all wars.
“The Mobile Vietnam Memorial Wall offers a variety of opportunities for reflection by the residents of Imperial County,” Henderson stated in the release. “For veterans, it is a chance to render respects to comrades in arms, some of whom we knew personally.”
He added, “To the families of those that fell, it is an opportunity to connect with their loved ones that have passed. For those that struggled with the war itself, it
represents the closing of a long and difficult chapter in our history.”
The effort to bring the mobile memorial to El Centro was started in 2019 by Jason Jackson, a local businessman and then an El Centro City Council member. He remains the city liaison for the project.
“This is an important project for me,” Jackson stated in the city release. “I have always had a great deal of respect, pride and enthusiasm for our military. To help bring the Veterans Memorial to Bucklin Park was a big milestone for us as a council and now the Mobile Vietnam Memorial Wall is another accomplishment for our city to help honor our residents that May served 8, 1926 or Oct. are 9, serving 2021 now.”
The mobile memorial also provides a place to educate young people about the war and engage the community, Henderson added.
“For those too young to know about the war, it is an opportunity to reflect on the 58,299 American lives lost to that conflict. Each name had a future life that was ended, opportunities that did not occur, and Francisco Cortez families that were lost or left incomplete." he stated. The concept for the mobile memorial began in Palmdale in 2005 as a prop for a play. It cost $102,000 to get built, the El centro release stated.