Staff Writer
rseaborn@pickenssentinel.com
UPSTATE - The Wall that Heals, a scaled-down version of the Vietnam Memorial Wall that sits on a permanent site in Washington, D.C., entered Pickens County on S.C. 123 just after noon Wednesday, as the clouds that threatened rain all morning parted, giving bystanders a glimpse of sunshine reflecting off the polished chrome of the parade of motorcycles accompanying it.
The tractor-trailer hauling the memorial paused momentarily at the Upstate fairgrounds as several hundred motorcycles joined the already large parade of bikers both leading and following the Wall to its destination of Clemson University's Bowman Field.
To honor the 53,249 names inscribed on the Wall, as well as to recognize the veterans escorting the memorial, investigators with the Pickens County Sheriff's Office, some Vietnam vets themselves, draped an American flag over the S.C. 153 bridge that crossed over the path of the procession and waved to the about 1,000 bikers as they passed beneath.
Detouring onto S.C. 93, the large convoy weaved through the downtown districts of Easley, Liberty and Central before stopping in Clemson, where volunteers worked in setting the wall against a backdrop of Tillman Hall and autumn-colored oaks.
"We've had huge numbers visit the Wall while we've been here," Barbara Smith, The Wall that Heals site manager, said. "It's been difficult for people to park, but they eventually did, and we've seen a large crowd."
The Wall, which is lighted, is available for viewing 24-hours a day, she said.
"People can come at two o'clock in the morning, if they want, and that is actually when a lot of vets want to come, when they can be alone," Smith said.
Smith said that while most soldiers returning home from war were welcomed and greeted as heroes, the men who fought in Vietnam were not treated with the respect they earned for doing the bidding of the United States, nor were they welcomed home from a war that took the lives of over 58,000 soldiers, wounded 303,704 others, and left about 75,000 men and women permanently disabled.
"We owe them all our gratitude," she said. "We need to thank all of our veterans, and we need to welcome our Vietnam vets home."
Vietnam veteran Denny Caldwell, of Seneca, said that Wall that Heals, and the lines of motorcycles accompanying it, brings an element of closure to those who fought in that war and survived.
"A lot of vets, they never got welcomed home," he said. "This is the parade we never got."
Walt Evans, of American Legion Post 113, in Pendleton, said he was glad that the Wall had come to the Upstate.
"I have a couple of friends on that Wall," Evans, who served in Vietnam during 1966, said. "I owe it to them to pay my respects, and to remember."
According to statistics compiled by the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, 9 million military personnel served during that war, with the average age of the soldiers dying there being 23 years old.
Whatever horrors soldiers witnessed while in-country are mostly never spoken aloud.
"It was sad," said Vietnam veteran David Ford, of Clemson. "And that's about all I've got to say about that."
To the friends and families of those whose names are inscribed on the Wall, as well as to Vietnam veterans themselves, the arrival of the traveling memorial is somewhat like bringing a lost soldier home again.
"There are a lot of names of Clemson graduates on the Wall," she said. "This weekend, they returned for Homecoming.
"They were here on campus, where they could listen to the carillon," Smith said. "This was their homecoming."
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