Arts of War on the Web

The Virtual Wall ® is an on-line web site that contains memorial pages honoring the 58,261 women and men whose names are inscribed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.

The Virtual Wall, which is not affiliated with the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund or the National Park Service, went live on line on March 23, 1997. It was started by Vietnam veteran Jim Schueckler, who today works with a team of other volunteers on the web site. The group includes Vietnam veteran Kenneth Davis and former Marine Channing Prothro, who also works with The Moving Wall.

Since 2000, The Virtual Wall has collected photographs of all those listed on The Wall in Washington. Early in 2002 The Virtual Wall began working with the Veterans History Project of the Library of Congress. Since then, The Virtual Wall regularly sends  a CD-ROM snapshot of the entire website to the Project. In that way all of the photographs, poems, letters, citations, and indexes from The Virtual Wall are archived permanently at the LOC.

The site includes indexes, which allow a visitor to search for a name by name or by city and state.  Among other things, that makes it simple to find out the names of those who died in Vietnam from any city or town in the country.

The organization called ImagineItSkins.com has concentrated on helping children heal faster and feel more positive during hospitalizations by providing bright, engaging images to hospitals and clinics. The Utah-based for-profit company has launched a new effort to put these kinds of uplifting images in VA Medical Centers around the nation.

To that end, they are looking for help in the form of images they can use that would be appropriate for VA hospitals. If you’re interested or would like more info, email Mark Padilla Viau at mark@imagineitskins.com If you do, tell him you read about on Vietnam Veterans of America’s Arts of War on the web page.