American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial
By: Nate R
Take a virtual walkthrough here.
In almost every conflict that the US military has been involved in, there have been many forgotten and disregarded soldiers that have had their life trajectory upended due to the horrors of war. While other memorials around the Washington, DC area and country do recognize permanently disabled American veterans in some way, there was historically a lack of explicit commemoration for this subgroup of veterans. That is why, in 2000, Bill Clinton signed a bill that allowed the Disabled Veterans’ Life Memorial Foundation to start fundraising in an effort to build a new memorial. The foundation took about ten years to privately fundraise the eventual $81 million it would cost to realize the memorial, and dedication of the memorial took place, highlighted by a speech by President Obama, in early October, 2014.
The memorial stands to represent disabled veterans from all wars and conflicts that the US military has engaged in, which is a group that may be as large as 5 million veterans [4]. Although it does publicly recognize the tremendous sacrifice that the veterans made in conflict, it also, and maybe more importantly, serves as a landmark message to the disabled veteran; that they are never forgotten and that there is precedent for them to recover and continue contributing to society. As President Obama put it in his dedication ceremony speech, “With this memorial we commemorate, for the first time, the two battles our disables veterans have fought – the battle over there, and the battle here at home – your battle to recover, which at times can be even hard, and certainly longer.” [1].
The memorial itself takes up its own triangular city block directly in view of the Capitol, which was intentional because veterans who have been disabled for life feel they are heavily impacted by the decisions made there, and want to have increased visibility for more consideration from policy makers [3].
Taking up the entirety of the block, the memorial has many different elements all with their own symbolic meaning. To start, there is a star fountain with a triangular pool that constantly flows and has a constant flame burning in the middle. The fountain is quiet and elegant, representing the disabled veteran and their continuing role in our society, and the flame represents the persistence that the disabled veteran embodies [3].
Another feature of the memorial is a series of 48 glass panels that are accompanied by four bronze sculptures. The panels have both images and quotes on them, and line the sidewalk that a pedestrian passes as they walk away from the Capitol. The 18 quotes that are inscribed into the panels are all by veterans themselves, and, as the architect of the project put it, “…stretch over the full history of the republic time-wise, span the different conflicts and different divisions. They tend to present a kind of mosaic composition of the range of voices that speak very personally to the process of injury and recovery, healing and really re-purposing of life.” [3]. The images that are on the glass panels also represent this wide range of experiences that a given disabled veteran might go through, so a range from battlefield action pictures to post-war recovered veteran portraits are displayed. All of the images tow a thin line of reflecting the hope that a disabled veteran should feel after they come home, as well as representing the gruesome and all out sacrifice that they displayed for our country in a time of conflict.
The four bronze sculptures that stand behind and are reflected by the glass panels represent four different stages of a disabled veterans healing process: call to duty and pride in service, trauma of injury, healing, and renewal of purpose [2]. The silhouette sculptures are abstract enough to be relevant looking images for any conflict that the US has fought in, but also are specific enough to embody the heavy process that every disabled veteran has gone through.
Partially bordering the triangular memorial are large, elegant granite walls with quotes by President Dwight Eisenhower and President George Washington on them. These quotes that are elevated to another level of importance by being on the granite walls along with the name of the memorial, become more explicit in what the memorial is aiming to represent. In President Washington’s quote, he calls a disabled American veteran the most “melancholy and distressing sight,” and considers it a public justice that these people are recognized. In President Eisenhower’s quote, he says that every disabled veteran “bears upon his body the permanent honorable scars of dangerous service… in order that our great nation might continue to live according to the expressed will of its own citizens.”
One last significant element of the memorial is nature that it has interspersed. Ginkgo trees are planted, and since they were once almost extinct in America, they represent the “survivor” that a disabled veteran also represents. These specific trees also bloom and peak a golden color in November, coinciding closely with Veterans Day, which made them ideal to populate the memorial with. Since the memorial is relatively new, these trees are still small and growing and the memorial will evolve over time to accommodate and embrace bigger and more established trees.
The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial is impressive in its ability to resonate and speak powerfully to veterans. from all wars and non-veterans of all ages. Through a variety of images and quotes that make up the substantive memorialization and a wide array of symbolism in the abstract elements of the memorial, disabled veterans’ sacrifice and grieving is depicted without sugar coating their experience, and their ability to recover and reimagine their lives is emphasized to promote hope. This memorial stands as a sobering yet provoking image and area as tourists and policy makers navigate Washington, DC. It reminds the non-disabled person or veteran of their privilege in a subtle manner.
Links for Further Reading
- President Obama Speaks at American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial Dedication
President Obama gives a 15 minute speech on Oct. 5, 2014 to commemorate the opening
and dedication of the memorial
- National Parks Service American Veterans Disabled for Life Official Memorial Website
“Through juxtaposition of granite and glass, the American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial conveys a combination of strength and vulnerability, of loss and renewal. Dedicated on October 5, 2014, the Memorial shines a light on the important lessons of courage, sacrifice, tenacity, loyalty and honor by bearing witness to the experiences of war heroes who were disabled as a result of military service. It is the first national memorial dedicated solely to disabled veterans, paying tribute to the hidden and visible disabilities from all conflicts and all branches of service.”
https://www.nps.gov/nama/planyourvisit/american-veterans-disabled-for-life.htm
- CBS News: “American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial”
Story About Opening and Dedication of the Memorial, Oct. 2014.
https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/american-veterans-disabled-for-life-memorial/
- Statistical Trends: Veterans with a Service-Connected Disability, 1990 to 2018
Data regarding Veterans with service-connected disabilities were derived from individual Annual Benefits Reports published on the VA website. The Veteran population has been declining since 1990 while the number of Veterans with a service-connected disability has been on the rise.
https://www.va.gov/vetdata/docs/Quickfacts/SCD_trends_FINAL_2018.pdf
- David A. Gerber: Introduction: Finding Disabled Veterans in History
“This introduction will proceed, first, to review the current state of our knowledge of the history of disabled veterans in Western societies, as we find it in a wide variety of scholarly, medical, and policy literatures; and second, to introduce the essays themselves. The former discussion is organized along the lines of the categories—representation, public policy, living with a disability—by which the essays themselves are grouped in order to assist in effectively contextualizing them. In reality, we may separate these aspects of the disabled veteran’s history only for analytical convenience. Meanings that culture and discourse have attached to the disabled veteran have much to do with how he has conceived his identity and how societies and political systems have defamed his place. Public policy has shaped cohorts and identities by creating a separate and relatively generous system of benefits. The veterans’ own agency in rehabilitation, reintegration, and public activism has influenced public perceptions and policy. Like other group histories, therefore, the disabled veteran’s is a densely constructed, ramifying totality.”
https://www.learningforjustice.org/sites/default/files/2017-08/veterans_history.pdf
6. National Park Service: Disability History: Military and Disability
“The United States has a long history of caring for its service men and women. Since the Civil War era, the Federal Government has provided doctors to support its veterans’ physical and emotional well-being. Battlefields and military hospitals help tell this story. All sites related to war and military action have disability history, since war inevitably means some soldiers will come home with short-term or long-lasting disabilities. As a result of these wars, medical, technological and social advances related to the treatment, programs, and perceptions or disability tend to increase.”
https://www.nps.gov/articles/disabilityhistorymilitary.htm