‘Personal’ Memorial to California’s Vietnam Dead

The names of the dead encircle scenes of what life was like then, much like the memories of the dead swirl around those who fought in the Vietnam War and lived.

The California Vietnam Veterans Memorial has the names marching in an orderly circle, carved in granite, quiet testimony to sacrifice and duty and the death of young people on the field of battle.

But inside, there is a young man reading a letter from home. There is a scene of a Marine taking a bath in a pond, while wearing a flak jacket and a helmet. There are nurses caring for the wounded. There are young men playing cards and eating Army food. There are young men in combat.

“This is for guys who are parents now. So they can show this to their kids and say, ‘This is what your Dad did. That’s the way things were and that’s the way we did things,’ ” said B. T. Collins quietly, as his left hand fingered the stainless steel hook where his right hand should be.

Collins and the other members of the memorial commission were taking a tour of the Nordhammer Foundry in Oakland in a residential neighborhood near Lake Merritt.

These were people, all of them veterans of Vietnam, who had conceived, planned and tried to fund the memorial to those who fought in America’s last war.

They were seeing various pieces of the memorial for the first time, seeing in form what had only been drawings during months and months of painstaking fund-raising work that still remains substantially short of its goal.

Scenes in Bronze

Amid the controlled clutter of the foundry, several plates had been laid on the floor, showing scenes forged in bronze, based on photographs taken in Vietnam.

In another room, a mannequin was arranged in the pose of what will be the memorial’s central figure--a soldier, sitting without helmet, weapon at rest against his knee, looking up from a letter from home.

“It’s a real personal memorial,” said Michael Larson, co-designer, who served with the Marine Corps in Chu Lai. “I think the Vietnam veterans who go to it will like it a lot. By and large I think there is going to be a wonderful shock of recognition, a feeling of ‘At last, here’s one about us.’ ”

The memorial has been in active planning for nearly two years. In September, Gov. George Deukmejian joined a ground-breaking ceremony for the memorial at its future site--a triangle of land near a rose garden, about 250 yards east of the state Capitol.

The memorial will be about 64 feet in diameter. The outer rim will be a 3-foot-high wall, benches and a circle of rose bushes. The actual memorial will be four curved unconnected walls, each 12 feet high, facing in on each other.

On the outside of the walls will be the names of the 5,822 Californians who died in Vietnam or are still missing--10% of the nation’s total dead and missing from the Vietnam War.

The names will be listed by hometown, the towns in alphabetical order. Within each town, the dead will be named in alphabetical order, along with rank, branch of service and age. Those who are still missing will have the initials MIA beside their names.

Inside the four walls, in the middle, will be the seated soldier.

On the inside of each wall will be panels depicting Vietnam--a large thematic panel 9 feet high, surrounded by six panels, each 21 inches square.

One wall is for medics and shows nurses, triage, field medics. Another depicts combat and includes images of soldiers on patrol, tunnel rats who climbed into tunnels dug by the Viet Cong.

Another wall depicts prisoners of war and the machines of war. A fourth is entitled simply, “At Rest,” and shows soldiers bathing, eating, talking to each other.

‘Everybody Represented’

“Everybody is represented on this memorial,” said Linda McClenahan, chairman of the commission, who served in Vietnam as an Army sergeant.

The memorial could be ready for dedication by fall, she said. But the arduous fund-raising effort has gotten no easier. Officials estimated about $1.4 million has been raised. Another $600,000 is needed to complete the project.

Larson, who co-designed the memorial with Tom Chytrowski, said they wanted it “to be authentic to the experience, rather than transformed into something it was not. . . . There are even some things that a Vietnam vet will smile at. It’s not just a very sad place.”