South Carolina

We drove on to Columbia, South Carolina next. We decided to try out my new GPS and it worked like a charm, took us right to the memorial park.

This particular memorial, at one time, was said to be the largest aside from D.C. It is really beautiful and has some unique components, like Shakespeare's Band of Brother's quote engraved upon the surrounding edge.

A feature not seen before is that after each of the 980 names engraved on the wall is the exact date of the loss or the day they became MIA. MIA's are denoted by a star next to their names. In addition, the names are grouped by county of residence.

There are several etchings on the central pylon depicting scenes from from the war and on the Plaza in front is a slightly raised and labeled map of Southeast Asia. Steve and I were able to point to the places we were and were surprised that he never got as far south as Saigon and I never got as far north as the Capital.

We did not have much time so this is the only site we got to in South Carolina. South Carolinians are very proud of their sons and daughters who served and the state has built numerous monuments and memorials to them. I hope to be able to return to honor more of these fallen heroes.

The memorial is located in Columbia City Memorial Park, on Gadsden between Hampton and Washington Streets.