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Contact: F. Gus Sanchez, (830) 868-7128, ext. 235 Johnson City, TX –Veterans from all wars will be recognized and their sacrifices commemorated at Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park Visitor Center, 100 Ladybird Lane, Johnson City, TX, on May 26, as park staff and the community focus on military service during the Vietnam War. Special activities including an American Indian Flag ceremony, veterans’ addresses, and the showing of a Vietnam documentary based on a Pulitzer Prize nominated book. All activities are free of charge. The opening ceremony will be held on Monday, May 26 (Memorial Day) at 10 a.m. Hilton Queton of Round Rock, Texas, a U.S. Air Force veteran and member of the Kiowa Black Leggings society (a traditional tribal warrior society), will conduct a Kiowa Flag ceremony honoring all military veterans. Mr. Queton will also deliver the keynote address, focusing on the history and significance of military service in American Indian cultures. The featured speaker for the event is Tom Striegler. A native of Irving, Texas, Tom Striegler’s roots go back six generations in the Texas Hill Country. His great-great-great grandmother and her daughter were among the original 120 German settlers of Fredericksburg. While serving as an artillery officer in Vietnam, he was decorated three times for valor, also earning the Purple Heart for wounds received while leading the defense of his battery against a Viet Cong attack on their perimeter. Mr. Striegler’s talk is entitled, “A Time to Remember,” and will be presented at 11:00 a.m. on May 26, at the Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park Visitor Center. At 12:00 noon, “The Moving Wall Remembered” a documentary video about the 2004 event featuring the traveling replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial to Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park, which generated notable community involvement and public participation, will be shown. This documentary will be shown again at 2:30 pm. At 1:00 and 3:15 pm., the park will show the Vietnam documentary film “Two Days in October”, based on the 2004 Pulitzer Prize nominated book “They Marched into Sunlight” by David Maraniss. As one book review states: “Here is the epic story of Vietnam and the sixties told through the events of a few tumultuous days in October 1967. The story unfolds day by day, hour by hour, and at times minute by minute, with a rich cast of characters -- military officers, American and Viet Cong soldiers, chancellors, professors, students, police officers, businessmen, mime troupers, a president and his men – moving toward battles that forever shaped their lives and evoked cultural and political conflicts that reverberate still”. A National Moment of Remembrance will be observed at 3:00 p.m. In addition, the rotating exhibit area in the visitor center will feature a special exhibit on “The U.S. Combat Soldier in Vietnam.” The Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park Visitor Center is located at 100 Lady Bird Lane in Johnson City, Texas. For further information or specific driving directions to Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park in Johnson City, please call (830) 868-7128, ext. 231. |
Last updated: February 24, 2015