Book Review
By Paul D. Spreiregen
Creating the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the Inside Story
By Robert W. Doubek
2015
McFarland; 311 pages, illustrated
www.mcfarlandpub.com
Photos: Paul Spreiregen
On any given day visitors to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington may number in the hundreds, sometimes the thousands. Immediately upon its dedication in November 1982 it became and has remained one of the most visited sites in our nation’s capitol. Extending tranquilly across a tree bordered meadow near the Lincoln Memorial, its power as a work of tribute stands among the great memorials of any time or place. It is an American icon.
Visitors to the memorial may know that a college student designed it in a nation-wide design competition and that the selected design was the subject of great controversy. Little else about its creation is known or need be known by a typical visitor. The memorial speaks for itself, honoring the nearly 58,000 Vietnam veterans who died in the war and by implication the millions of others who served. As a work of public art it honors memory and service admirably.