Doubek contacted the National Personnel Records Center, Archives and Records Service, in St. Louis, Mo. The USO is a not-for-profit organization and not part of the Department of Defense (DoD). The names are arranged in the order in which they were taken from us by date and within each date the names are alphabetized. This change prompted the addition of 110 names in 1986. For weeks and weeks, a team worked through the list, verifying spellings and ensuring that the computer printout that was to be used for the stenciling was correct. A few years after the dedication, the issue of geographic criteria was expanded by DoD to include people who had been killed outside of the war zone while on or in support of direct combat missions. EIN: 52-1149668, Copyright 2023 The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, Javascript must be enabled for the correct page display. Every one of the names on the Wall has a story worth telling, as do all who served in our nation's Armed Forces during that time. An estimated 11,000 women served in Vietnam. With this list in hand, he went to the various locations where individual service records were kept to review files. This is the genius of Mayas design, said Scruggs. The very young were considered by many to be preferred combat material. The popularity of the GI Bill after Vietnam emphasized this yearning. With the end of the Cold War, many now believe that at its outset the Vietnam War was a quite honorable extension of our ultimately successful policy of Communist containment; that our effort in Vietnam became flawed because of political and strategic failures having nothing to do with those who died there; and that these young Americans were asked by three presidents and six Congresses to give up their lives so that freedom would have a better chance in the world. Folded American flags were presented to his parents and an Air Force helicopter flew over the ceremony. Perhaps more important, many of them probably did not yet fully understand their own mortality and were therefore less likely to be hesitant in combat. They also died quickly, many within a few weeks or months of arriving in Vietnam. "Walking through this park-like area, the memorial appears as a rift in the earth, a long, polished, black stone wall, emerging from and receding into the earth. The National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis maintains Vietnam War Official Military Personnel Files (OMPF). And they often show a heartbreakingly wry sense of humor with the same sensibilities as their college-bound peers. As the Vietnam War dragged on, Kurt tried twice to enlist. The National Archives prepared these state level casualty lists by creating extracts from the Korean War Extract Data File and the Vietnam Conflict Extract Data File, both as of April 29, 2008, of the Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS) Files, part of Record Group 330: Records of the Office of the Secretary of Defense. More Info At www.themovingwall.org Visit site The casual visitor might not immediately recognize that Buis name is the first. Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund | 3033 Wilson Blvd, Suite 300 | Arlington VA 22201 | 202.393.0090 In the event a service members remains are returned or accounted for, then a diamond symbol is engraved over the plus sign. Each entry includes a panel number and letter; "W" is for "west" or the left half of the memorial, "E" is for east, or the right half of the memorial. Copies of WWII though Vietnam era (men born April 28, 1877 to March 28, 1957) Selective Service Records may be obtained from the National Personnel Records Center, in St. Louis, for a fee. The Names - Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund The Names When the Wall was dedicated in 1982, there were 57,939 names inscribed. These young men were trained quickly and shipped to Vietnam quickly. Protestants were 64.4 percent (37,483), Catholics were 28.9 percent (16,806). On the other end of that phone call was an former Air Force officer who had served in Vietnam. Indeed, officer casualties of all branches were overwhelmingly white. offer to read the block of names that includes their special names. The draft policy at the time of the Vietnam War was called the Universal Military Training and Service Act. As Vandegeer piloted his CH-53 helicopter toward the island, a wall of anti-aircraft fire knocked it from the sky, and it crashed toward the water with 26 men aboard. Yet, a civilian heroine who served in a different capacity during that difficult time also merits particular acknowledgment. By his estimate, he helped pull out close to 2,000 people. site, for searching with a word processor. For blacks, however, only 7 percent placed in categories I and II and 93 percent placed in categories III and IV. "Home of record" does not necessarily refer to the place of birth, residence of next of kin, place of longest residence, nor other common uses of the term "hometown." He did it allsing, dance, create music and crack wise. Lins vision prevailed. In quieter moments, they rode horses along the Coronado Trail, stalked deer in the Apache National Forest. When the Wall was dedicated in 1982, there were 57,939 names inscribed. By providing your mobile phone number, you opt in to receive calls and texts from USO. Additionally, many of the names on the wall were other teenagers from the suburban white collar communities with siblings who were in, or would go on to college, but who, as individuals themselves, were slow to mature, struggled through high school and were therefore very available for the Vietnam War. Black leaders, including Martin Luther King Jr., protested, and President Johnson ordered black participation in combat units cut back. Learn more about featured topics of the Vietnam War and Vietnam Era. If each compiled by Military Records and Research Library, Department of Military Affairs; edited by Julia D. Rather and Jeffrey Michael Duff, Research Our Records. The civilian and military men who formed the policy did not see it necessarily as a disadvantage. What will be the evolving historical judgment for those names on the Wall? 997 soldiers were killed on their first day in Vietnam. National Mall and Memorial Parks , Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Download the official NPS app before your next visit. But in 1966, President Johnson and Secretary of Defense McNamara decided to institute Project 100,000 that would allow category IV men to enter the military. On the last day of his life, in the moments before our nations history changed forever, Dale Buis was sitting around a rec center watching a movie called The Tattered Dress, starring Jeff Chandler. The slabs meet at a vertex of 125 degrees, 10 feet above ground level to form the Wall. The numbers on the wall ascend from the center out toward the left and right extremes. They enjoyed roaring beer busts. The major service academies and other military colleges provided close to 900 of the Vietnam officer casualties: the U.S. Military Academy, 278; the U.S. Air Force Academy, 205; the U.S. The panel number is a number/letter combination, such as 10W or 35E. United States. Honoring the men and women who served in the controversial Vietnam War, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial chronologically lists the names of 58,318 Americans who gave their lives in service to their country. Military Reunions, Screensavers, Rubbings, Personal Guestbook for all Names. The Selective Service System remains in place today. Therefore, a complete listing of the records that were lost is not available. Beallsville, Ohio with a population of 475 lost 6 of her sons. is complete, or you've done a "save as", you can use any word processor The first known casualty was Richard B. Fitzgibbon, of North Weymouth, MA; he was listed by theDepartment of Defense as having been killed on June 8, 1956. In an effort to further preserve the legacy of those who sacrificed all in Vietnam, VVMF is committed to finding a photo to go with each of the more than 58,000 names on The Wall. As many as 3 million people visit each year, according to some estimates, and they come for probably as many reasons. On Patrol caught up with Pete Peterson to find out how the U.S.-Vietnam relationship has progressed since the normalization of ties in 1995. 39,996 on the Wall were just 22 or younger. The Order of Precedence For Military Ribbon Wear, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pubH-5CulqI, Military Funeral Guide for Families & Funeral Homes, The Ultimate Military Gift Guide for Unique Military Gifts, Black Military History and Black Medal of Honor Recipients. Air Force Historical Research Agency 600 Chenault Circle Maxwell AFB, AL 36112-6424Telephone: (334) 953-2395, ArmyU.S. Few areas of the world have been as hotly contested as the India-Pakistan border. The Wall USA is a non-profit endeavor maintained by veterans . One additional factor, often overlooked, that influenced volunteer enlistment was military tradition the influence of fathers, grandfathers, brothers, uncles and others who had served in previous 20th century wars. 1972, United States, National Archives, Military Records, 1885-2004, United States, National Archives, Korean War and Vietnam War Records, Start your Military Service Record Request, National Archives at St. Louis, Selective Service Records. It forces us to the conclusion that many of those names on the wall were kids who just couldnt quite get it together in high school, a little late in maturing intellectually, and didnt have the resources or the guile to get out of the way when the war came. How many names are on the wall? Its still fought in the bodies and minds of the men who waged it all those decades ago. Marine Corps History Division2044 Broadway StreetQuantico, Virginia 22134Telephone: (703) 432-4877, Coast GuardU.S. . Some have tried for years before receiving approval from DoD. The lists are based on the "home of record - state" data provided by the serviceman or woman upon last entrance into military service. And they are so respectful when they do the engraving. The 1970 census which is being used as our Vietnam era population base did not list an Hispanic count but gave an estimate of 4.5 percent of the American population. Though 13 were rescued at sea, the rest died, either upon impact or soon after. Eight women were killed in Vietnam, five Army lieutenants, one Army captain, one Army lieutenant colonel and one Air Force captain. In addition to WWII Draft Records, the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis, MO maintains Post-WWII through Vietnam Era Selective Service Records, for all men born before 1960. The idea that American enlisted dead were made up largely of societys poverty stricken misfits is a terrible slander to their memory and to the solid working-class and middle-class families of this country who provided the vast majority of our casualties. On the Vietnam Veterans Memorial site in Washington, D.C., a special plaque reads: "In Memory of the men and women who served in the Vietnam War and later died as a result of their service. The west wall is on the left when standing facing the vertex, and the east wall is to the right. About 58 thousand of the 7 million American service men and women who served in Vietnam died. Vandegeer was on a mission to rescue the crew of the SS Mayaguez, a merchant ship captured three days earlier off the coast of Cambodia by the Khmer Rouge. In civilian life, poor aptitude testing can have a tremendous negative impact, whether for college placement or for simple job advancement. But given the draft policies, the hard-sell recruitment, the severe escalation from month to month and the refusal by President Lyndon Johnson to call up the older reserves and National Guard, it could not have been otherwise. 1st Class Michael J. Carden, "'The Vietnam War' Sponsor Bank of America Teams With The Lumineers to Support the USO ", Programs for Service Members and Their Families. Quite a different profile emerges among the Navy and Air force officer corps. There was no need to embellish. for all 58,228 names to be read aloud. Database of the 58,195 Names on The Wall in Wash,D.C. Download our app to find events, locations and programs near you. THE NAMES ON THE WALL: AN HISTORICAL JUDGMENT. To put a circle around the symbol beside their names would not provide the correct historical context related to their situation. Their sons, if not college material, made up a significant part of the volunteers and draftees. The casualty date is the date the person was killed or wounded in combat or injured during an accident; for the missing, the date is when the person was reported missing. It is forgotten now, but in the beginning Congress and most of the American people were behind our containment effort in Vietnam. The Vietnam Wall at the Buffalo and Erie County Naval & Military Park features the names of local fallen soldiers. History is a guide to navigation in perilous times. 1970 NAID 570973, State-Level Fatal Casualty Lists sorted Alphabetically by Last Name, List of United States servicemembers and civilians missing in action during the Vietnam War (196165) Wikipedia, U.S., Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Unaccounted-for Remains, Group A (Recoverable), 1941-1975, U.S., Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Unaccounted-for Remains, Group B (Unrecoverable), 1941-1975, Vietnamw-Era POW/MIA Databases & Documents. Each name is listed with great honor and respect. We searched the National Archives Catalog and located a series titled Muster Rolls and Personnel Diaries, 1941-1980 in the Records of the U.S. Marine Corps (Record Group 127). the person they know. With the glitch discovered, Doubek and his team located and hand-corrected each error. The list of names begins at the vertex of the walls below the date of the first casualty, 1959, and continues to the end of the east wall. Chronological order by date of casualty allows friends and family members to pick out their loved one from all of the others with the same name. The panel numbers are inscribed at the bottom of each panel. The Reading of the Names is an in-person event where every single name on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial is read in order of which it appears on The Wall. Making these arrangements and printing the pages takes considerable They often reveal a typically warm American family atmosphere. Of the 8000 Coast guardsmen who served in Vietnam, 3 officers and 4 enlisted men were killed and 59 were wounded. in chronological order of the casualty date and then alphabetical by last Full casualty records may be retrieved online through the National Archives' Access to Archival Databases resource. The 58,152 names of those who died in Vietnam are etched onto the two rising black marble slabs of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. ), EDUCATIONAL LEVELS OF ENLISTED CASUALTIES. And there is an end. The names are arranged in the order in which they were taken from us by date and within each date the names are alphabetized. The Vietnam Wall. All were nurses, all were single and all but one were in their 20s. 54 soldiers on the Wall attended Thomas Edison High School in Philadelphia. Army Major Dale Buis name is etched into the granite half an inch tall, no bigger or smaller than any of the others. It is hard to believe it has been 36 years since the last casualties. Thus, the wars beginning and end meet. These names are followed by the inscription: Our nation honors the courage, sacrifice and devotion to duty and country of its Vietnam veterans. There is no question that all segments of American society were represented. Another browser may inform you that it does not know how to display the file On the west wall, the symbol precedes the name; on the east wall, the symbol follows the name.