Small Iowa town honors its veterans

Small Iowa town honors its veterans

Vinton, Iowa, is a very typical small town USA.

One of our better achievements is the placing and honoring of our veterans of Vinton and Benton County. We have two memorials honoring local veterans and some placed in honor of their accomplishments in our community, incliding Legionnaires from American Legion Post 57.

One memorial is a 105mm Howitzer honoring a 30-year Marine major that passed on. Another was a 30-year Navy veteran who served in World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

Two more memorials have been ordered for the Vet's Memorial Park thru the contributions of the locals of Benton County and one from a platoon sergeant that was with one of three local boys that were KIA in Vietnam. The platoon sergeant is from Chadds Ford, Pa. and contacted me to see if we had any place for a memorial bench honoring the three. I of course told him absolutely, as our Vet's Park is right across the street from our house. Also while looking for the memorial bench, we ran across a memorial stone that honors all veterans past, present and future. The VFW and the AmVets decided the Stone would be a wonderful addition to the park so we contacted several locals for contributions, and acquired enough money to order the memorial stone. We're hoping the memorial stone and the memorial bench will be in place by Memorial Day.

This Memorial Park is a huge asset to our neighborhood, and we really enjoy seeing it and watching Old Glory fly free every day.