Traveling Vietnam memorial makes stop in Kernersville
Fred Claassen (center), 93, of Winston-Salem, chats with fellow Vietnam veterans Vernon Bessling (left) of Belews Creek and Stephen Amos of Walkertown in front of a replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial during a stop for the exhibit in Kernersville Monday. PAUL GARBER/WFDD
The Kernersville Veterans of Foreign Wars hosted the Vietnam Traveling Memorial Wall for four days.
Polished black panels with white lettering lined the length of the Kernersville VFW parking lot as hundreds of visitors paid their respects to the nearly 60,000 names engraved on the wall of men and women who lost their lives during the Vietnam War.
The wall is a three-fifths-size replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial located in Washington, D.C. It travels the country to allow people who would not otherwise be able to see it to experience the powerful site.
Mike Phillips, a veteran who served during the Vietnam War, is glad that people are getting the chance to see this memorial and understand the sacrifices that were made by those in the line of duty.
“It is a story that needs to be told and kept being told because it was very important," he says. "It changed my life forever and certainly all these men and women on the wall and probably most of the people who come and see it.”
The Kernersville stop concluded on Monday. The next location for the Vietnam Traveling Memorial Wall is in Melbourne, Florida.
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