Alaska VI

Just before the virus hit the fan I traveled back to Alaska. My son and I went to visit my friend John who had arranged for us to work on the Iditerod dog sled race. The race is held each year to commemorate the attempt to get medicine to Nome during an epidemic in the early 1900's.

While there I decided to check out the Vietnam memorials in Anchorage and Wasilla. I had read that these had been renewed and or rebuilt since I first photographed them years ago.

Boy did that turn out to be a good decision. Each is greatly improved.

Today, I will begin to share with you the first one I ever saw in Alaska. It sits on Park Strip in Anchorage, as before, but it is much more elaborate, well planned and even more special.

As you can see the snow was quite deep but the path had been cleared to ease access. One thing the Alaskans know how to handle is snow!

This guy is still there, standing guard, but I must say he was not so elaborately decorated previously. Maybe a new take on being a decorated soldier.

Originally there were two plaques listing the 57 from Alaska who were lost. As you can see here, new memorials have been added as was the intent of the judge who allowed that memorials could be placed along the Delaney Park Strip. This was an interesting and complicated story that you can read about elsewhere on this site.

The original two plaques have been revised in to just this one. I was pleased to see that no new names have been added in the passing years. Frankly, this is a bit unusual, I rarely see sites these days where names that were missed the first time have not been added at a later date.

There is a lot more here on this updated site and I will write more about it in the near future.

In the mean time, plan to join me in Arizona, when we revisit on the 18th, as always at 9:00am.

To see other memorials from Alaska, or any other site, please click the state name ion the left side of this page