A Powerful Experience at The Vietnam Wall in Butte, Montana

I kept getting messages and phone calls from our listeners and readers about how powerful their visit was to "The Wall That Heals" in Butte, Montana. 

The Wall That Heals is a travelling exhibit of the Vietnam Memorial back in Washington, D.C. I've visited "the wall" in DC as we call it on several occasions, but I knew I had to see the travelling wall in Butte. (Click here for Tommy O's initial report on The Wall That Heals in Butte. Devon Brosnan also filed this update later in the week)

I remember over a decade ago when I got to tag along for a Big Sky Honor Flight to the WWII Memorial in D.C. with some WWII veterans. One of the most powerful moments of that trip was when one of the WWII veterans from Montana stood up out of his wheelchair and used a small American flag to point to his son's name on the Vietnam Memorial.

Seeing the wall in Butte and, more importantly, the Vietnam Veterans who were there to see it was also incredibly powerful. It was also a bit overwhelming.

As an Iraq/Afghanistan veteran, we all owe so much to these Vietnam Veterans. We owe it all to those who never came home. And the reason us younger veterans are treated so well, is because of these Vietnam Veterans who fought to make sure our nation's veterans were never treated the way they were treated when they got home.

One Vietnam Veteran sitting alone on a park bench told me how it was "all so overwhelming" as he looked out at the wall in Butte. 

Matt Egloff, a veteran who lives in Butte, wrote me after he visited the wall. I ran into him Friday night in Uptown Butte as well. He said some of the local Vietnam Vets he spoke with "found the box of cookies and the baby sweater to be the hardest things to look at, and I don't think anyone would disagree...the 52yr old care package of cookies on the left arrived days after Charles Stewart was killed. It was returned to his mother and placed unopened in his closet for the next 21 years. Then a family friend left it at the wall in DC with an explanatory note. There are some beers left for David Slagle. Donald Detmer's mother left his baby sweater and a letter, which I don't think anyone could read aloud. The baby sweater and the care package were the hardest artifacts to think about. There is no grief like a mother's grief for her lost child."

Here's the photo Matt shared with us:

Here's more photos that I took of The Wall That Heals in Butte: