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Hicksville Vietnam War Era Memorial

Only 3 new names were added in March for a new total of 1,774, but good progress continued in filling in missing data for many of the people on our List of Names. 

As in the past, you can continue to help this effort by scanning the List of Names; using your class year or years you may be familiar with as a reference, to see if you have a new name or some missing data to email to us.  Class years, where known, are specifically shown to make this effort easier for all our readers.

Missing data is becoming even more important at this phase of the project than in the past, as we are likely reaching saturation in the number of new names that are still missing from the list and need to complete the data phase before we can make the list ready for the bronze plaque engraver.

In the area of site selection and approval, Bill Walden has had contact with the Hicksville School System and is waiting to hear if they will approve having our Memorial erected at the high school or the current Memorial Garden located at the Jerusalem Avenue Middle School .  Bill has also received numerous suggestions for JFK Park, located at the intersection of Broadway and Jerusalem Avenue as a great location and will be checking this out in April.

Ken Strafer has made progress on the bronze bas relief for our Memorial's center stone.  Approval and a suitable photo has been received from one of our female Vietnam Era Veteran's to use her likeness for the relief and that is being sized and sent to a bronze casting site.  Approval on a photo for one of our male service members is still pending.  Text for the center plaque is also under development.

Memorial Qualifications:  A person must have been on active duty in one of our Armed Forces during the Vietnam Era.  The person did not necessarily have to serve in Vietnam , because by being in service at that time he or she faced the possibility of being sent to Vietnam and was an integral part of strengthening our Armed Forces during a time of war. 

Overall qualifications include:

• must have been a resident of Hicksville at some time before entering our Armed Forces
• must have attended a public, private or parochial high school while living in Hicksville (attendance at HHS not required)
• must have served on active duty anywhere in the world during America 's Vietnam Era (February,1961 through April,1975)
• Both men and women qualify (We're stating this since, while continuing to add a number of women, we still have relatively few on the current list overall)

While we have now accumulated 1,774 names, there may still be more people out there who served and meet the above qualifications, but have yet to be identified.  Rough estimates made at the beginning of this project indicated we should be able to collect between 2 and 3 thousand names, so we are very close getting close to that goal, particularly since it was an "educated SWAG"!  While we have access to official records in Washington , D.C. , we found that many people left Hicksville before entering the service and show a different town or city as their home at the time of entry.  So, we need to continue this grass roots effort and will also continue to use official records as a means of confirmation of all personnel on the list. 

Our Project Team consists of the following HHS Alumni and Vietnam War Era Veterans:

·        Ken Strafer, Founder (HHS '62)

·        Joe Carfora, Master List (HHS '62)

·        Carl Probst, Input Data, Class of '59 & Others (HHS '59)

·        Tony Plonski, Input Data, Class of '64 & Others (HHS '64)

·        Tommy Sullivan, Press Release Editing (HHS '63)

·        Walter Schmidt, Hicksville Local Coordinator & Town of Oyster Bay Veterans Services Officer (HHS '65)

·        Joe Ingino, Veterans Advocate, Hicksville & Long Island (HHS '67)

·        Jay Tranchina, Input Data, Class of '64 & Others, plus local press contact (HHS 1964)

·        Bill Walden, Cmdr of Hicksville VFW Post, Site Selection/Approval & Fundraising Leader (HHS '65)                                                   

Here's what we continue to need from each person reading this to do:

Please click on this link to review the current list of names:

If you know of someone who is not listed, or if you have information we are still missing, please send what you have to Joe Carfora at jcarfora1@nc.rr.com.  Please use the information contained on the current list as a guide for the data we need.

Thank you!

The Vietnam War Era Memorial Project Team

Footnote extracted from www.vietnamwar.com:  During 15 years of military involvement, over 2 million Americans served in Vietnam with 500,000 seeing actual combat. 47,244 were killed in action, including 8000 airmen. There were 10,446 non-combat deaths. 153,329 were seriously wounded, including 10,000 amputees. Over 2400 American POWs/MIAs were unaccounted for as of 1973.

To access a huge list of veteran related websites that offer assistance, visit http://buffalobobcasale.com