The Wall That Heals 

March 31-April 3
Lake Benson Park (921 Buffaloe Road) 

The Wall That Heals is coming to Garner’s Lake Benson Park March 31 through April 3. Our community will honor those service members who are remembered on The Wall, will respect the men and women who survived their service in Vietnam and will educate hundreds of people about the Vietnam War.

The Town of Garner and Show N Tell Ministries are presenting the traveling wall. To visit the Garner Wall That Heals website, please go to garnerwall.com.

Overview

The Wall That Heals is a traveling ¾-scale replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. The Wall That Heals is 375 feet long and 7.5 feet tall at its highest point. The names of the more than 58,000 American service members who died in Vietnam are engraved on The Wall’s 140 panels.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which built the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, created The Wall That Heals. Like The Wall in Washington, visitors can do name rubbings of individual service members' names on The Wall.

The Wall—and mobile educational center accompanying it—with be accessible 24 hours a day during its installation at the park.

Tuesday, March 29, National Vietnam Veterans Day

The Wall begins its journey to Garner’s Lake Benson Park on Main Street in Clayton on noon. The Wall will travel the length of Main Street with an escort of hundreds of motorcycles before turning onto Robertson Street. As the escort passes Clayton High School, the Comets’ ROTC members will be in uniform and welcoming The Wall.

The escort will take U.S. 70 to Garner, and the Garner Fire Department will greet the group as it nears the town. The Wall will continue to Timber Drive en route to the park.

Garner Mayor Ken Marshburn will greet the riders and The Wall at Lake Benson Park and proclaim Vietnam Veterans Week. There will be a group photo.

Wednesday, March 30, Assembling the Wall

The N.C. State Air Force ROTC will make up the majority of the 40 men and women who will assemble The Wall. The Wall stretches 375 feet in length and is made up of 140 panels. The crew needs about eight hours to erect The Wall.

Thursday, March 31, The Wall Is Open

The Wall will be open to the public. It will remain open until 2 p.m., on Sunday, April 3. Reservations are not needed to visit The Wall, but reservations are needed for tours. There are no souvenirs. There are no concessions. There is no admission fee.

Friday, April 1, Candlelight Service

The Wall will be open all day, and at 7:30 p.m., there will be a candlelight service at The Wall. More than 100 Scouts will be on hand to help light the way. Dr. James Johnson, a chaplain in Vietnam, will be the featured speaker as the community places nine wreaths—one each for the eight community men who died in Vietnam and one as part of the In Memory program that remembers those service members who survived Vietnam but who have now died.

Saturday, April 2, Welcome Home: A Walk to the Wall

All Vietnam veterans are invited to come Walk to The Wall as a part of a Welcome Home celebration. Hundreds of flag-waving people are expected to line the quarter-mile roadway in front of the park as the veterans ride in trams to The Wall at 2 p.m. The U.S. Marines 2D Aircraft Wing Band will lead the way and provide a short concert before remarks by Joe Marm, a Medal of Honor recipient, and U.S. Marine Col. Samuel Lee Meyer, a Garner High graduate.