The 11th day of the 11th month

Veterans and their friends and family congregated at Blair House in Washington Friday morning to commemorate Veterans Day. At promptly 11 a.m., members of the American Legion fired a 21-gun salute and then stood in silence while Mike Orris played Taps on the bugle. Prior to the 21-gun salute, attendees listened to Dan McClure, a 43-year veteran of the military, who read an essay titled, ?Who is a vet??

?He or she is a nurse, who fought against futility and went to sleep sobbing every night for two solid years in Da Nang (Vietnam),? he said. ?He is the POW who went away one person and came back another, or didn?t come back at all. He is the drill instructor who has never seen combat but who has saved countless lives by turning slouchy rednecks and gang members into soldiers, and teaching them to watch each other?s back. He is a parade-riding Legionnaire who puts on his ribbons and medals with a prosthetic hand.?

Dave Stoufer was the guest speaker and he said that, while not a veteran himself, he appreciates what veterans have done and that he has heard many of their stories over the years. He said that he was very upset at the way in which Veterans Day is trivialized and commercialized.

Earlier in the day, a group of veterans and their friends met for a ceremony at All Veterans Memorial Park on Lexington Boulevard. Doug Conrad served in Vietnam and said that he has numerous family members who have served in the military.

?My dad?s name, my name and my brother?s name are all on the wall here,? he said. ?My nephew just got back from Afghanistan and I?m going to put his name on the wall, too. We?ve all been in the same branch, the Army, except my brother, Gary, who was in the Air Force in Vietnam.?

Al Currie also served in Vietnam and that military service is common in his family.

?My dad, Paul, served in Europe during World War II and in the Korean War,? Currie said. ?He landed on Normandy. My brother-in-law, Jack Kallenberger,  served during the Cold War in Europe. My sister was an Army nurse in Vietnam.?

Currie said he was pleased with the appearance of the memorial and he said it was clear that a lot of work went into building it.

Jerry Bartachek served as a hospital corpsman with the Navy in Vietnam from 1966-1967.

?I never got any holes in me but I was so close to things exploding I could feel the heat,? he said. ?We were part of an infantry group and we would go out looking for the enemy, the Viet Cong. We went on patrols day and night, walking through rice paddies, sleeping through rain with your helmet on your face.?

Bartachek said he was issued a firearm, a .45 pistol.

?I did shoot it once,? he said. ?I shot a beer can. I was with the Marines, so of course it was an empty beer can or else they would?ve killed me.?

McClure said that local veterans are attempting to bring a half-size version of the Vietnam War Memorial to the All Veterans Memorial Park. The smaller version is called ?The Wall that Heals? and is 180 feet long. The wall travels the country to give Vietnam veterans a chance to see it up close.

?We?ve got Vietnam vets who are too sick or too injured to see the real wall,? he said. ?People would be surprised at this wall. You wear gloves when you set it up. It?s guarded 24/7. You don?t mess with it, because you?re going to have a Vietnam vet all over you in a heartbeat.?