Authors' note: The authors acknowledge the assistance of Roger Brodin, Diane Carlson Evans, P. Evangeline Jamison, and the VWMP in gathering material for this study. Congressman Bill Frenzel and J. Carter Brown, Charles Atherton, and Sue Kohler of the Commission of Fine Arts also discussed issues bearing on the project with us. Bill Day of the Detroit Free Press generously allowed us to reprint his editorial cartoon in support of the VWMP.

1. “Rain, Rain, Go Away,” T.V. Guide, 01 23, 1988, p. 19Google Scholar; Baker, Kathryn, “‘Tour of Duty’ in Ratings War,” Birmingham (Al.) News, 04 25, 1988.Google Scholar

2. Furey, Joan A., “For Some, The War Rages On,” American Journal of Nursing (11 1982): 1695–96Google Scholar; Boodman, Sandra G., “Nurse's Vietnam Memories Stir Debate,” Minneapolis Star and Tribune, 06 20, 1983Google Scholar; Langone, John, “The War That Has No Ending,” Discover (06 1985): 44–53Google Scholar; McVicker, Sara J., “Invisible Veterans,” Journal of Psychosocial Nursing 23 (10 1985): 13–19Google ScholarPubMed; and Egendorf, Arthur, Healing from the War: Trauma and Transformation after Vietnam (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1985), pp. 270–71.Google Scholar

3. Holston, Noel, “‘To Heal a Nation’ Tells of Wounds Off Battlefield,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, 05 29, 1988Google Scholar. The film was loosely based on Scruggs, Jan C. and Swerdlow, Joel L., To Heal a Nation: The Vietnam Veterans Memorial (New York: Harper and Row, 1985).Google Scholar

4. Bayles, Martha, “The Road to Rambo III,” New Republic, 07 18 and 25, 1988, p. 34Google Scholar. Jane Fonda's anti-war activities and her appearance in Hanoi may have aroused the terrible animosity they did because she became an American version of the treacherous enemy female, and thus doubly shocking. Whatever the reasons, veterans' groups continue to be rabid on the subject of Fonda, prompting a recent “apology” on her part on national TV; see “Veterans Get Fonda Apology,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, 06 17, 1988.Google Scholar

5. Holston, , “‘To Heal a Nation’.”Google Scholar

6. “96 More Names Set for War Monument,” Associated Press dispatch, November 11, 1986, P.M. cycle.

7. Spelts, Doreen, “Nurses Who Served-And Did Not Return,” American Journal of Nursing (09 1986): 1037–38Google Scholar. The women listed on the wall are 2nd Lt. Carol Ann Drozba, USANC (US Army Nurse Corps), d. Feb. 18, 1966; 2nd Lt. Elizabeth Ann Jones, USANC d. Feb. 18, 1966; 1st Lt. Helwig Diane Orlowski, USANC, d. Nov. 30, 1967; Capt. Eleanor Grace Alexander, USANC, d. Nov. 30, 1967; 2nd Lt. Pamela Dorothy Donovan, USANC, d. July 8, 1968; Lt. Annie Ruth Graham, USANC, d. August 14, 1968; 1st Lt. Sharon Ann Lane, USANC, d. June 8, 1969–the only nurse killed under direct enemy attack; and Capt. Mary Therese Klinker, USAF, d. April 9, 1975. In 1973, a statue of Sharon Lane-the only Vietnam nurse memorial in the United States-was erected in Canton, Ohio, outside of the hospital where she worked.

8. Marshall, Kathryn, In the Combat Zone (New York: Penguin, 1987), p. 11Google Scholar, notes that Purple Hearts (1983)Google Scholar was the first Vietnam movie to include a meaningful portrayal of the role of women in the war. Produced by Kenneth Utt and directed by Miller, Robert Ellis, Intimate StrangersGoogle Scholar was rebroadcast by CBS on June 19, 1988.

9. Morrison, Mark, “‘China Beach’ Salutes the Women of Vietnam,” Rolling Stone, 05 19, 1988, pp. 75–79Google Scholar; and Harvey, Alec, “Series Premiere Promises New Look at Vietnam Era,” Birmingham (Al.) News, 04 25, 1988Google Scholar. The first one-hour episode of the show, aired a week after the two-hour introductory movie, featured a female flower seller who lobs a grenade into a group of GIs. In a twist on that old saw, her papers show her to be a VC nurse. McMurphy hates her until, in an emergency, the VC nurse saves an American patient. McMurphy then lets her escape.

10. “Statistics Reveal Big Role Women Had in Vietnam,” Florida Nursing News, 11 14, 1987, p. 7Google Scholar; Rasch, Loyne, “America's Forgotten Warriors,” Woman's Newspaper, Central Jersey ed. (March 1986), pp. A1–3, A26Google Scholar; and Fish, Lydia, “Nurses at the Wall,” American Association for the History of Nursing Bulletin (Fall 1986): 3Google Scholar. According to the Vietnam Women's Memorial Project, Inc., the mission of which takes in the creation of an accurate statistical record, military women in Vietnam included more than 7,000 Army nurses, 680 WACS, 27 women Marines, and 550 WAFS; see undated press release (ca. November, 1985), VWMP.

11. Hobbs, Nancy “Women Veterans Seek Memorial,” Salt Lake Tribune, 11 8, 1987Google Scholar; and Goodwin, Ann Daly, “Build War Memorial for Tears Held Back,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 04 23, 1986.Google Scholar

12. Walker, Keith, A Piece of My Heart: The Stories of Thirty Six American Women Who Served in Vietnam (New York: Ballantine, 1985), pp. 369–82Google Scholar and statistical tables, pp. 418–29; and “Martha Raye,” The Vietnam Veteran (Gastonia, N.C.) (02 1986): 4.Google Scholar

13. Devanter, Lynda Van with Morgan, Christopher, Home Before Morning (New York: Warner Books, 1983)Google Scholar is dedicated to the memory of Sharon A. Lane. See also Winegar, Karin, “Vietnam Voice,” Minneapolis Star, 02 2, 1982Google Scholar, discussing Patricia Walsh's newly published Forever Sad the Hearts (New York: Avon, 1982)Google Scholar, a novelized account of the author's work as a civilian AID nurse in Vietnam in 1967 and 1968 (the period of the Tet offensive).

14. Quoted in Rolling Stone, 05 19, 1988, p. 79.Google Scholar

15. McRobbie, Joan, “The Unsung Heroines of Vietnam,” McCall's (05 1987): 159Google Scholar; and Podgus, Christopher, “Eight Names on the Wall Belong to Women,” Veteran (11 1986): 27.Google Scholar

16. Borden, Cliff, “Vietnam Nurse,” Wisconsin Veterans of Foreign Wars News (01 1985): 54Google Scholar; and Dorothy Lewis, “Vietnam Nurses Honored,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 08 12, 1984.Google Scholar

17. McEnroe, Kate McCarthy, “Viet Nurse Fights for Memorial,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 04 13, 1986.Google Scholar

18. Paul, Elizabeth A., “Wounded Healers: A Summary of the Vietnam Nurse Veteran Project,” Military Medicine (11, 1985): 571–76Google Scholar; and McRobbie, Joan, “The Women Who Served,” Pacific Sun (Mill Valley, Cal.), 06 13, 1986Google Scholar. See also the first-hand accounts in Freedman, Don and Rhoads, Jacqueline, eds., Nurses in Vietnam: The Forgotten Veterans (Austin: Texas Monthly Press, 1987).Google Scholar

19. McEnroe, , “Viet Nurse Fights,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 04 13, 1986.Google Scholar

20. Marling, Karal Ann and Silberman, Rob, “The Statue Near the Wall: The Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the Art of Remembering,” Smithsonian Studies in American Art 1 (Spring 1987): 14–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

21. Horder, Karen, “Soothing the Wounds,” Leader Telegram (Wis.), 07 7, 1984Google Scholar; and Leslie, Michele, “Nurse Leads Memorial Drive,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, 05 28, 1988.Google Scholar

22. For example, Kirylo, Moira, “Vietnam Women Suffer with No Healing in Sight,” Marquette (Minn.) Tribune, 04 15, 1988.Google Scholar

23. Evans, Diane Carlson, “Vietnam's Unknown Warriors,”Google Scholar unpublished poem, ca. 1983, included in letter to K. A. Marling, August 29, 1988. See also Boulay, Donna-Marie and Evans, Diane Carlson, “Vietnam Nurses Memorial Project Raising Funds for Bronze Statue,” Minerva 2 (Fall 1984): 20–22Google Scholar; and Evans, Diane Carlson, “Nurse,” Reflections of Vietnam and Beyond 1 (1986): 21.Google Scholar

24. Abrams, Arnold, “Vietnam's Other Vets,” Newsday, 07 28, 1986.Google Scholar

25. Interview with Brodin, Roger, 08 25, 1988.Google Scholar

26. Abrams, , “Vietnam's Other Vets,” Newsday, 07 28, 1986.Google Scholar

27. Kaszuba, Mike, “Steel Soldier Stalls in Trek to Capitol,” Minneapolis Star, 02 4, 1982Google Scholar; Jones, Jim, “Sculptor Says Work on Soldiers' Memorial Eased His Anguish,” Minneapolis Tribune, 05 23, 1982Google Scholar; and Mansour, Theresa, “Vietnam Vet Sculpts Quizzical Soldier,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 07 27, 1981.Google Scholar

28. Macintosh, Craig, “Profile: Roger Brodin,” Minneapolis Star, 07 30, 1981Google Scholar. Brodin's third Vietnam monument, The Price of Freedom Is Visible Here (an Army nurse tending to a wounded soldier supported by a buddy), was unveiled in 1987 on the lawn of the VA Medical Center in Minneapolis; see Silberman, Rob, “The Public Trust,” Artpaper (Minneapolis/St. Paul) (11 1987): 22Google Scholar. See also Strait, Jerry L. and Strait, Sandra S., Vietnam War Memorials: An Illustrated Reference to Veterans Tributes Throughout the United States (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland and Co., 1988), esp. pp. 125–27.Google Scholar

29. Heibert, Gary, “Honor Women Who Served,” VFW Magazine (08 1986): 24–26Google Scholar; “Statue Will Honor Women Who Served in Vietnam,” Winston-Salem Journal, 05 3, 1986Google Scholar; and Rogers, Dennis, “Memorial for Women Who Served in Vietnam Is Long Overdue,” (Raleigh, N.C.) News & Observer, 05 13, 1986.Google Scholar

30. Goodwin, , “Build War Memorial,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 04 23, 1986.Google Scholar

31. Marling, and Silberman, , “The Statue by the Wall,” Smithsonian Studies (1987): 13–14, 16–18.Google Scholar

32. For example, Lang, John S., “First Anniversary: A Memorial Wall That Healed Our Wounds,” U.S. News & World Report (11 21, 1983): 70.Google Scholar

33. Those who attended the April, 1984, organizational meeting called by Brodin and Evans included Gerald Bender, director of the Agent Orange project for the Minnesota Veterans Affairs Department and Donna-Marie Boulay, a lawyer and former Army nurse. Evans, Bender, and Boulay became the officers when the group incorporated in the summer of 1984. See Rix, Kate, “Metal of Honor: Memorial for Women in Vietnam,” City on a Hill (Santa Cruz, Cal.), 01 8, 1986, p. 23.Google Scholar

34. Radloff, Gary, “Ex-Viet Nurse Wants Statue for Women Vets,” LaCrosse (Wis.) Tribune, 04 20, 1986Google Scholar; and “Vietnam War Era Nurses Announce Bronze Statue,” (Williamsport, Penn.) Sun-Gazette, 05 24, 1986.Google Scholar

35. The first public showing of The Nurse was on July 8, 1984, during a press conference in Brodin's studio. In August, a second showing was held at the Landmark Center in St. Paul to kick off a drive to raise funds to install a large-scale version of the statue on the 2.2-acre Washington Vietnam Veterans Memorial site. Plans called for three 33-inch statues to tour the nation in aid of publicity and fund raising. Brodin also made and sold 7½-inch replicas in a limited edition and a 2½-inch medallion picturing the statue (20 percent of the proceeds from the medal went to the VWMP). A pendant was also designed but not produced.

36. Mary Ann Attebury, Major, USAFR, “Women Vets Gather in Washington, D.C.,” press release, September 17, 1986, VWMP.

37. “Backgrounder: Vietnam Women's Memorial Project,” undated press release, VWMP. These goals have been restated in much of the publicity geared to the statue fund.

38. Brodin proposed an edition of one thousand statuettes and five thousand medals. Wherever Brodin's traveling statue has gone, women veterans have been moved to come forward with their stories and the phenomenon has been widely reported. See, for instance, “They Went to Vietnam Unarmed,” Philadelphia Inquirer, 05 24, 1982Google Scholar, in which D-M Boulay describes the process: “I have seen women reach up and touch the face and say, ‘I think I served with that woman’ — [and] then the tears come.”

39. See note 37, above, and the VWMP's updated mission statement, “Invisible Veterans: A Legacy of Healing and Hope” (1988)Google Scholar. Many other clubs and organizations for nurses, women, veterans, etc., also endorsed the goals of the VWMP.

40. In an Associated Press story of May 24, 1986 (see, for example, “Women Kick Off Campaign to Add Statue to Memorial,” Manchester (N.H.) Union Leader), Wheeler described an overwhelming sentiment in the post-Vietnam era to recognize the military contribution of women, despite their small enlistment numbers. “Statistics aren't what governs the heart,” he added. In this same article, Cooper Holt, executive director of the Washington VFW office, noted that women had not been drafted either: they were “volunteers in the truest sense.” See also Abrams, , “Vietnam's Other Vets,” Newsday, 07 28, 1986.Google Scholar

41. Borden, Cliff, “Vietnam Nurse,” Wisconsin Veterans of Foreign Wars News(01 1985): 56.Google Scholar

42. “Statue Recognizes Women Veterans,” (Doylestown, Penn.) Daily Intelligencer, 11 11, 1986Google Scholar. Similar sentiments are expressed in “They Also Served: Women in 'Nam,” Philadelphia Inquirer, 11 29, 1986Google Scholar: “They took care of us back then,” says Tom Frame, “and it's time for us to take care of them now.”

43. “Memorial Project,” The Vietnam Veteran (12 1984): 9.Google Scholar

44. AP dispatch, “Hodel Hears Plan to Add Woman to Memorial,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, 09 11, 1987Google Scholar; and “Women Gain a Key Ally for Vietnam Statue,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 10 13, 1987.Google Scholar

45. All citations of testimony at this key meeting come from Minutes of the Commission of Fine Arts, October 22, 1987, pp. 5–90. This document is on deposit at the Commission's Washington office.

46. Rhodeside had been hired by the VWMP to find a suitable location for their statue on the Memorial grounds.

47. Public Law 99–610, “Women in Military Service for America Memorial,” November 6, 1986. No design has yet been put forth for this memorial (although preliminary plans for a competition have been announced), which has been allocated a prime site on the end of the Avenue of Heroes on the approach to Arlington Cemetery. VWMP members resent having their idea telescoped into this plan because it still fails to solve the problem of exclusion raised by the all-male Hart group near the Wall. For the women vets of Vietnam, the Women in Military Service Memorial is a kind of ladies' auxiliary affair, separate but unequal.

48. Forgey, Benjamin, “Women and the Wall,” Washington Post, 10 22, 1987Google Scholar. See also Forgey, 's “The Wall, Complete” Washington Post, 02 13, 1988Google Scholar, in which he accuses Congress of catering to special interest groups bearing sculpture and warns that there could soon be an “entire platoon of statues” in Constitution Gardens.

49. “Honoring Women Who Served,” Washington Post, 11 11, 1987Google Scholar. See also “Leave the Vietnam Memorial Alone,” Washington Post, 02 27, 1988Google Scholar; “Don't Statue It Up,” Savannah Morning News, 05 19, 1988Google Scholar; and “Why Spoil the Vietnam Memorial?” Washington Post, 05 19, 1988.Google Scholar

50. Quoted in Forgey, Benjamin, “Commission Vetoes Vietnam Women's Statue,” Washington Post, 10 23, 1987.Google Scholar

51. The open letter by D-M Boulay of October 23, 1987, was used as a VWMP press release and appeared as an insert in many veterans' publications in the months that followed. See also “Women Vietnam Vets Seek Recognition,” Stars and Stripes, 11 11, 1987Google Scholar, in which Boulay adds: “Mr. Brown exceeded his mandate by making the broad statement that the Vietnam Monument is complete. That's not his job. His job is to advise upon the artistic merits of the various projects put before the commission.” Her letter also alleged that the Commission had ignored its own staff report in rejecting the statue, but no such report seems to have been written. Boulay was probably referring to an informal meeting at which Secretary Atherton remarked offhandedly that the proposed placement of the statue looked fine to him. To some extent, Boulay's attack on the Commission unfairly exaggerated and personalized its decision and saw villains where there were only bureaucrats. On the other hand, the Commission made no effort to understand the social context in which the women's proposal had been framed. This mutual blindness resulted in the persistent deadlock.

52. See “Female Vietnam Veterans Have Their Share of Problems, Also,” Tuscaloosa News, 11 11, 1987Google Scholar; and “Honoring the Women,” Rossmoor (Cal.) News, 12 2, 1987Google Scholar, in which veteran nurse Evangeline Jamison states: “They say the healing process is complete.… Well, I work at the veterans' center in Concord and we're still getting 30 men a month for counseling. The healing is not complete.”

53. Letter to the New York Times from Barbara L. Shay (North Adams, Mass.), 11 11, 1987Google Scholar. Shay specifically links rejection of the statue to the broader issue of sexism: “As long as males downgrade the contributions of women in the services - in the same military specialities' as men - many of the veterans' organizations will continue to be almost exclusively male clubs in their communities. It is time that we recognize that women are veterans too!” A similar letter (Zimmer, Ellen Diderich, “Healers Belong With the Heroes in Honoring War Veterans,” Arkansas Gazette, 02 28, 1988)Google Scholar called the ruling a “slap in the face” and a “sexist decision.”

54. Viets, Elaine, “Picking a Bone With a Bureaucrat: Official Links Canine Corps with Valor of Servicewomen,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 01 26, 1988Google Scholar. Mazzotta also discussed Hart's statue: “Those three guys don't represent everybody.… A man is not a woman. If they had left the memorial a wall of names, with no statues, I'd say if was fair.… [But] the women deserve some recognition. They were there. They were under fire. Give them their statue and let them get on with their lives.”

55. “Assembly Okays Vietnam Memorial to Women Who Served,” The (Sacramento, Cal.) Progress, 02 10, 1988.Google Scholar

56. The act signed by Reagan authorized the VWMP to establish a memorial “on Federal land” under the procedures spelled out in the Commemorative Works Act (thus reaffirming the veto power of the Commission of Fine Arts), but stops short of requiring its placement on the Vietnam Memorial site: “It is the sense of the Congress, with respect to the location of the memorial… that it would be fitting and appropriate to place the memorial within the 2.2 acres of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.” The Senate bill (S2042) would have mandated placement of the women's statue on the Memorial grounds, thereby limiting the jurisdiction of the Commission over the design of the statue. The Senate version also included a “sense of the Congress” clause that would have discouraged further meddling with the site: “After the addition of a statue of a woman Vietnam veteran, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial will be complete, and no further additions to the site should be authorized or undertaken.” This provision was designed to pacify the foes of “proliferation”; it may also have been directed against the annual effort of a diehard California conservative, Congressman Dornan, to have an enormous flagstaff erected above the vertex of the black walls.

57. “Vietnam Women's Memorial,” Hearings before the Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on Public Lands, National Parks, and Forests, U.S. Senate, 100th Congress, February 23, 1988. The record of the House hearing, on June 21, 1988, before the Subcommittee on Libraries and Memorials of the Committee on House Administration has not been printed, but the testimony submitted is available at the subcommittee office.

58. See “Plan to Honor Women Vietnam Vets Criticized,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, 02 24, 1988Google Scholar. In the Senate hearings, Doubek coined the “sculpture garden” term while “Disneyfication” was the invention of Shelly Mastran, a geographer from George Washington University speaking against the Nurse. On Swit's role as Margaret “Hot Lips” Houlihan, see Reiss, David S., M*A*S*H: The Exclusive, Inside Story of TV's Most Popular Show (Indianapolis: Bobb-Merrill, 1983), pp. 96–105Google Scholar. An especially poignant episode for Swit was “The Nurses” (1976–77 season) in which Houlihan confessed feelings of loneliness and isolation to her fellow nurses; the story paralled the emotional progress of the Vietnam woman vet from isolation to revelation. See also Kalter, Suzy, The Complete Book of M*A*S*H (New York: Harry Abrams, 1984)Google Scholar. In remarks delivered during the early stages of the Senate debate over the Durenberger bill, Alan Cranston specifically mentioned Swit's “passionate speech”; Congressional Record, 11 20, 1987, S16701.Google Scholar

59. A group led by Diane Evans and supported by Roger Brodin filed a lawsuit against Boulay, charging that she kept inadequate financial records, spent excessive amounts on first-class travel, and failed to provide relevant information to board members. Boulay vigorously denied the charges of extravagance and mismanagement, claiming that the 37% fund-raising costs posted in the previous year had been mandated by the board. The suit was dropped as soon as the board was reconstituted. See “Memorial Board Replaces Chairman,” St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, 05 10, 1988Google Scholar; “Vietnam Women Vets Replace Leader of War Memorial Effort,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, 05 11, 1988Google Scholar; and “Senate Panel OKs Statue of Nurse at Vietnam Memorial,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, 05 12, 1988.Google Scholar

60. “Action on the Women's Memorial,” Washington Post, 06 22, 1988.Google Scholar

61. “$85,000 in Royalties for Memorial Sculptor,” Washington Post, 11 11, 1987Google Scholar. Although there have been mutterings in Congress recently about the propriety of any private individual retaining a financial interest in a national monument, much of Hart's split of the royalties (the rest goes to the WMF) has been spent in legal action against those infringing on his copyright. Brodin's current contract with the VWMP would give him a full 90% of any royalties; that figure may be far too high to stand up in the face of public scrutiny.

62. Hess, Elizabeth, “Statue of Limitation?” Village Voice, 07 15, 1986Google Scholar, calls Brodin's Nurse as “sentimental as a Hallmark card.”

63. Under questioning by Congresswoman Oakar during the House hearing, Commission of Fine Arts member Neil Porterfield suggested that, if Congress required the Commission to rule specifically on the Brodin Nurse, they would do so on a yes or no basis because the only duty of the Commission was to pass on finished proposals. The comment suggests that the Commission may be positioning itself to reject Brodin's statue on aesthetic grounds. Such a decision would represent a sad departure from precedent. Especially during the 1930s, when the level of art activity in the District was high, artist-members of the Commission of Fine Arts routinely advised artists at work on federal projects, often offering specific counsel on details of anatomy, proportion, symbolism, etc. This interactive relationship has not persisted in part because the individualistic aesthetic of modern art was antithetical to collaboration. Also, objective standards of correct rendering and the like, valid for traditional forms of representation, were not pertinent to abstract statuary. For many examples of the Commission's practice of offering suggestions to sculptors as they worked, however, see Gurney, George, Sculpture of the Federal Triangle (Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1985).Google Scholar

64. Records in the files of the Commission of Fine Arts show that Brown has suggested that, if necessary, a commemorative bronze bas-relief honoring women might be situated unobtrusively somewhere near the entrance to the Memorial, in the vicinity of the flagstaff. But this is not a workable solution to the problem. Such a relief would not give women veterans equal sculptural representation and it would, indeed, open the gates to all manner of didactic, commemorative art at the Memorial, providing such art is of modest size and two-dimensional character.

If a limited competition (open to a roster of invited sculptors) were to be held to find a new Nurse for the site, Brodin would, to be sure, be one of the contestants.

65. See Kohler, Sue A., The Commission of Fine Arts: A Brief History, 1910–1976, with Additions, 1977–1984 (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1985).Google Scholar

66. “Vietnam Women Veterans' Statue Now Going the Legislative Route,” Washington Times, 11 11, 1987.Google Scholar

67. James Watt to J. Carter Brown, February 25, 1982, in the files of the Commission of Fine Arts.

68. The wording inscribed on the Wall, at the upper right panel of the vertex, appears in letters no larger than those used for the names. It reads: “In honor of the men and women of the armed forces of the United States who served in the Vietnam War.”