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Newsgroups: soc.veterans Path: sparky!uunet!spool.mu.edu!news.nd.edu!mentor.cc.purdue.edu!mace.cc.purdue.edu!jewell From: jewell@mace.cc.purdue.edu (Larry Jewell) Subject: 'NamVet Newsletter, Vol.4, no.6 (6/7) Message-ID: <By3FDp.DrB@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> Sender: news@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (USENET News) Organization: Purdue University References: <By3Ew1.CAG@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1992 01:13:00 GMT Lines: 1005 NAM VET Newsletter Page 77 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 me in the face with her purse. I said, 'Shit. This is what I came home to.' I went out and got a drink. I didn't want to come home if this was how it was gonna be." Cervando, a tough ex-marine with a drawer full of medals, said to me: "Look around you. There are still people who are ashamed to say, 'I'm a Vietnam veteran,' because they are scared that people won't talk to them. I've been insulted. 'Sir, were you one of them butchers over there? Did you really enjoy killing babies and people?'" Another veteran remembered one event that haunted him when he was awake and in his dreams: "I see this kid, twelve or thirteen years old, with his leg blown off, telling us in Vietnamese to go home and let the Vietnamese do their own fighting. At the same time, he was yelling to kill us. I turned away and somebody killed him." Bill, who lost his leg in a mine explosion, told me this nightmare, which recurred several times a week for four years: "We were on a search-and-destroy mission and were going through a friendly village. A baby was crying in a hooch, and no one else was anywhere around. My buddy went into the hooch and the captain shouted, 'DON'T PICK IT UP!' but my buddy didn't hear the warning and reached for the infant. The baby was booby-trapped with a grenade. It exploded. There was nothing recognizable left of the baby and only parts of my buddy. I'll never get that cry and explosion out of my head. Never." Mike, a paraplegic, had been accidentally shot in the back by what was called "friendly fire." A buddy's M-16 went off and severed Mike's spinal cord. Now confined to a wheelchair, with excruciating, intermittent pains in his thighs, Mike was referred to me by the Vet Center because of his severe depression and nightmares. He said: "Vietnam was a high for me. I was seventeen years old, and that shit was better than any combat movie I had ever seen. It was for real. Sometimes I would think it would be nice to stay there, at and the end of a year I extended my time in Vietnam. Six weeks later I was shot in the back." Mike's dream: "The Americans have turned on me. It is as if I am the enemy. They tied me to a tree and threw axes at me. Sometimes I dream I am a POW being captured by the Americans." I worked with Mike once a week for eleven months. Only once did he complain about having been shot by an American and wonder what his life would have been if he hadn't been shot. Mike NAM VET Newsletter Page 78 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 dreams: "We called one of the guys Coke Bottle because of his thick glasses. They blew the top of his head off. 'PICK HIM UP, MAN!' There were pieces of his brain and shit on my boots. We took his body to the LZ and the AK-45s were cracking. Pass the word -- 'They got Coke Bottle!' We dropped napalm. I dug in, scared, crying my ass off. 'Maybe he's not dead.' There was artillery fire all night. I feel asleep and had a frightening kind of dream of the sounds of elephants coming at me. I woke up screaming. We moved out in the morning. They lift Coke Bottle sitting up in a hoist, blood and all." After I had been working with Mike for three months, his nightmare stopped completely and his depression lifted, but then he began to bleed from his bowels. He was admitted to Ward 13 at Fort Sam Houston. He remarked that the first time he had been admitted to that ward was 13 years before on the thirteenth day of the month, and he had weighed eighty pounds. He said, "There was something about that ward from the first day I saw it. It seemed to me that it was going to be a part of me for the rest of my life." Although Mike was afraid that his depression would return, it never did. He didn't know why his war dreams had changed and then stopped. He said: "Maybe it had something to do with seeing you. In the past, if I had one of those dreams or flashbacks, I'd start trembling and sweating. It would worry the hell out of me. Now I sit back and accept the fact that talking about Vietnam is not going to change anything. I don't think of Vietnam. But how the hell can I live like this?" The surgeons removed a cancer of the colon and performed a colostomy. Mike was convinced that his cancer was caused by Agent Orange. The last time I saw Mike on that ward, he was semicomatose and weighed eighty pounds again. I wanted to say something to him, but I didn't know what, and the silence was painful to me. His loving wife was at his side. Seeing him there, I thought back to Christmas time eight months previously, when he had told me how he had envied the simple Vietnamese lifestyle and the beautiful countryside, and that he had never hated the Vietnamese. Mike said to me last December, "What would I say if a doctor told me I had so many months to live? I'd probably go ape-shit!" But of course, he didn't. He died rather peacefully. He and I had been relieved that his depression, nightmares, and flashbacks had gone away, but at the same time he had developed symptoms of cancer. That was both bewildering and disheartening. For one brief moment I wondered if he would have been NAM VET Newsletter Page 79 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 better off with his depression, as if that had warded off the cancer, rather than heralding it. He and I had done the best we could. Fate had its own hand to play. His healing nightmares had done their work. I reviewed all the audiotapes of our meetings, I found no clue that his unconscious was reacting to his impending death. Not even in his dreams. Perhaps, as Jung noted, the unconscious does not take much notice of our death but rather reacts to our attitude towards dying. Still I wondered why this had happened just as his spirits were lifted, his life was joyful, and his marriage more happy than ever before? Was it possible that the depression had been the alarm signal of impending peril, and unconsciously he had sought me out to help him die? I thought perhaps that was the case. What I could do for most of the veterans I saw was to give them a handle on their dreams and terror, to convey an attitude that there was meaning to their suffering and sacrifice. Even if the situation was not SO hopeful after all these years, there was hope. It goes almost without saying that my work with these men was often painful to me. Many times I asked myself why I had taken it on, or more correctly, why it had taken me on. At times I experienced war nightmares and dreams of combat. Then I knew that the suffering of the men was getting to me, and I would take a few days off from working with them. This is one of my dreams: I see the silhouette of a large aircraft carrier off the shore of Vietnam. It was a dark night, and I could just make out the outline of things. Then I am on the deck. Suddenly all over the deck I see muzzle fire of revolvers and rifles. I am running to avoid being shot, but the firing seems haphazard and I am not really in any danger. I am astonished that while men were shooting every which way, no one was getting hit. At that point it dawned on me that these were all security officers, naval intelligence, CIA, and FBI, and that they were trying to kill an enemy somewhere on the ship. Then the shooting stops, and a naval intelligence officer tells me that the man has escaped off the ship, which was not tied up at a Vietnam pier. What does that dream mean? How was it trying to help me? What was all this shooting about? Surely it was a dream of the shadow, the whole image of the dream was shadow. And the dark forces that were holding out escaped, as is always the case with the shadow. You cannot kill the shadow. It always survives or is recreated. I knew that. Here on the ocean of the unconscious, close by Vietnam, all of the intelligence powers of America were trying in vain to kill the shadow. And so it became obvious to me that even the most intense concentration of intelligence of all the thinking powers could not cope with the enemy I was trying to find. In short, I had to reach my subject from a feeling more than NAM VET Newsletter Page 80 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 a factual approach to the American shadow. Perhaps this is best explained in the final lines from "King Lear:" The weight of this sad time we must obey, Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say. The oldest hath borne most; we that are young Shall never see so much, nor live so long. [3] And so it is important to point out that the most stressful dreams the veterans had were not of their own danger -- of being shot, maimed, or killed -- but of seeing others, particularly their buddies, and next the children, and then women, being killed and slaughtered. George's dream: "We get into this village about six miles north of Da Nang. A bunch of little children are running towards us. Our captain yells, 'FIRE!' When we fire, they explode. they were loaded with grenades. They were booby-trapped. We really blew them away. They just blew to pieces." Children were often killed because they were armed or booby-trapped. George said, "That's what's shattering my nerves." We all know about My Lai and atrocities involving shooting children in cold blood, but do we know about grenades killing booby-trapped babies and the shooting of armed or booby-trapped children and civilians? These occurred often enough so that the men involved, as well as those who heard stories from buddies, and who became psychological casualties, carried a heavy burden of guilt and a great sadness. Wilson, a marine sergeant who spent two years in Nam, told me this nightmare, which recurred once or twice every week: "There is a big flash and everybody is hurting and crying, 'MEDIC! MEDIC!' Then everyone is kinda lying there, hearing the helicopters come in. I see an army lieutenant walking across the field with no foot. It was blown off. I hear him getting on board the damn helicopter, dragging the bone across the steel deck. I'm being medevaced in that helicopter. DAMN! It hurts to look at it. He doesn't even know what is happening. I wake up sweating, and say, 'Oh, shit! That happened all over again.' I get a real bad headache then. I just lie there. I feel like something is coming apart at the seams. I lie there, trying to relax. Waiting for the sun to come up. I can't sleep." Now a story that demonstrates the soldier's identification with his dead buddy and his survivor's guilt. And that touches the heart of my paper -- death and compassion. Mario, a tall, brooding marine sergeant, was sent home to escort the body of a buddy who had been his close friend since childhood. Mario said to me: NAM VET Newsletter Page 81 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 "I came back to stand in the funeral with two other marines as honor guard. My buddy's wife came up to me and said, 'Why did you let him die?' I just flipped out there. I took off out of the funeral home, and for a long time I held that guilt within me. I wasn't sure if it was my fault or not. Maybe she just needed someone to blame it on. When I went back to Vietnam, I went back to be killed. I really didn't want to go back home at all. Now I have a nightmare about how it actually happened." Mario's dream: "My buddy gets hit. I am close enough to reach him but I can't do anything. He is dying. The right side of his head is totally gone. It looks like hamburger, and the other side is a mess. I don't know what hit my buddy, but for some ungodly reason he is still alive. I hold him between my legs and he bleeds to death." THAT is the psychological, social, and physical reality of death. THAT is the story of bravery and selflessness of the hero who became the American anti-hero. THAT is what the conflagration of war does to men and women. THAT is the primitive basis of the pain that comes when people are slaughtered and maimed and butchered, when there are no words to articulate what happened....and no one wants to hear them anyway. And it comes relentlessly in the dream, in the black of night. "To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come...." [4] Until only a few years ago, Americans had turned their backs on the Vietnam veteran. Since symbolically our shadow is at our back, the metaphor is apt. But it is changing, and at long last understanding of the Vietnam veteran becomes possible. Yet we Americans have not yet faced our shadow, and we project our evil. We are still caught in the American myth of the hero and the hubris that always attends the hero motif. The hero myth is also the myth of invulnerability expressed in the good-bad guy westerns and the shoot-out between the sheriff and the lawbreaker. As in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, unleashing the powers of good and evil to go their separate ways is a fatal mistake. The integration of both good and evil is the way to heal the nightmare. That is what the transpersonal psyche is trying to do in dreams of war. And without mourning and grief worked though, the inner shadows continue to torment us all. "He that lacks a time to mourn, lacks a time to mend. Eternity mourns that. 'Tis an ill cure NAM VET Newsletter Page 82 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 For life's worst ills, to have not time to feel them. Where sorrow's held intrusive and turned out, There wisdom will not enter, nor true power. Nor ought that dignifies humanity." [5] The characteristic war nightmare, as I have said, is recalled as precisely as the real event. It is perceived as the reality. At first the reality of the trauma images in these dreams led me to think that they were something like the substance of what nightmares are made, rather than ordinary dreams. And in the end, it might be that these are indeed the archetypal dreams of war. As expressions of circumstances to which human beings are subject and in which the reality image itself is the most powerful expression of the feeling involved, they have no basis for metaphorical transformation. And there is no antecedent human resource or experience that can mollify the intensity of the images. Such archetypal dreams are both symbol and metaphor inherent in the original image, which is frozen in time and place. I have classified the war dreams into three categories. The first is the characteristic war (trauma) dream, in which the dream is reported to be a replication of the actual trauma, EXACTLY as it happened. This represents 53% of the dreams told to me. The second group of dreams are the VARIABLE dreams, which portray the exact trauma but elaborated with sequences that did not happen but which might conceivably have happened. Such dreams might include images of the here-and-now and life experiences from the past. They constitute 21% of the dreams. The third group of dreams are like ordinary hallucinatory nightmares and constitute 26% of the total dream sample of 359 war dreams. [6] All these men suffered because they were caught in a tragic situation. Each one is innocent, in the sense that what happened to him was far greater than anything he had done to provoke it. They are like the mountaineer (in Northrup Frye's image) whose shout brings down an avalanche. [7] He is guilty in the sense that he lives in a world where injustices are an inescapable part of existence. I am referring to the collective guilt as personified in the shadow of the hero -- the anti-hero. It is well known that most veterans came back home and made successful re-entries into society. For vast numbers of Vietnam veterans, the experience in Vietnam was a positive one. While most of the men I saw felt positive about the closeness, tightness, even brotherhood among the combat veterans, the war still raged. Some of the dreams of veterans are allegorically prophetic. A Texas veteran dreams he is on a street in Dallas: "I am trying to warn people that another war is coming. People are laughing at me. I yell, 'Hey, there's a war going to happen! You'd better take cover and get off the street!' but the people laugh at me. They wouldn't listen to me. I am going to NAM VET Newsletter Page 83 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 secure a position by chopper, but the helicopters fly off and leave me there. I wake up angry and afraid. When the choppers leave, I have lost my last link. Without it, I am not part of the unit anymore." In our world today, too much evil is done and too little is said about it. There is no shortcut to facing the depth of the impact of war on the human psyche, and denial wears off. "There is no pill called salvation," says the Mayo Clinic psychiatrist Howard Rome. No pill will cure the wounded psyche of the warrior. Novalis said, "Whatever the spirit that calls, a kindred spirit will answer." This is the way to help the wounded warrior. We who try to help these men must realize that we ourselves are wounded healers. Once, long ago, when I was sitting in the Stanford University Chapel during other troubling times, these words came into my mind: "Things are better than they are." Many times since, these words have come when I needed them most. I hope they are the words of the human psyche speaking through me, not by me, to you. NOTES: [1] William Broyles, "Peace Be With You," Reader's Digest (March 1982). [2] W.H. Auden and Louis Kronenberger, eds., The Viking Book of Aphorisms (New York: Viking Press, 1962), pg 90. [3] Shakespeare, "King Lear," V.iii. [4] Shakespeare, "Hamlet," III.i. [5] Sir Henry Taylor, "Philip van Artvelde (1839)", part I, act I, scene V. [6] The format and motif of war dreams and their classification are reported in a paper: Harry A. Wilmer, "Combat Nightmares: Towards a Therapy of Violence," Spring (1987), in press. [7] Northrup Frye, Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973), pg 41. HARRY A. WILMER was the founder, director, and president of the Institute for the Humanities at Salado and professor of psychiatry at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. Awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1969, Wilmer has written five books and [more than 150] medical articles. While on active duty NAM VET Newsletter Page 84 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 in the US Navy in the 1950s he worked with Korean War veterans. His work with the nightmares and post-trauma stress of Vietnam veterans at the Audie Murphy Hospital in San Antonio is reported in his book, DREAMS OF VIETNAM. ----- Source: UNWINDING THE VIETNAM WAR: FROM WAR INTO PEACE. Reese Williams, Editor. Seattle, Washington: The Real Comet Press, 1987. Pages 68-82. | | |____====________ ||__________}____)==================|) =============---------------------===_____ /| | | | |\\ \________|__________|_________|_________|/ \\(O)___(O)___(O)___(O)___(O)___(O)// NAM VET Newsletter Page 85 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 ================================================================== I n - T o u c h - N e w S e r v i c e ! ! ! ================================================================== In-Touch. What is it ??? Input by: Ray "Frenchy" Moreau NAM VETs IN-TOUCH Section Editor Herndon Byte eXchange - Herndon, VA (703) 471-8010 ================================================================= |+++++++++++++++++++++++++ IN TOUCH ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++| | There are some 43 million people in the United States whose | | lives were directly and irrevocably touched by the Vietnam | | War. | | | | Almost four million people served in Vietnam -- the longest, | | and perhaps most difficult, war in our history. More than a | | quarter of a million were seriously wounded. 58,175 are dead | | or missing. | | | | Each of those who returned recognizes the true cost of war. | | But so too do the families and friends, wives and lovers of | | those listed on the Wall. They too paid a tremendous price, | | not always recognized... many still do. | | | | Though twenty years have passed, it seems that is the period | | people have needed to get the distance necessary to begin to | | address the unresolved, deeply personal issues that have | | been haunting them since the war. Perhaps that is a measure | | of the pain. | | | | But, the "healing of a nation" that was intended by the | | building of the Memorial, has begun. | | | | In the office of the Friends of the Vietnam Veterans | | Memorial, we hear them on the other end of the phone on | | any given day, and far into the night, they call from all | | corners of the country. | | | | "If only I could find out..." | | "I need to find his family so I can keep my promise..." | | "I just want to talk to someone who was with him... " | | "Please, can you help...?" | | | | At the Wall, we find them every day. Veterans who have not | | spoken of their experiences even to their most intimate | | family members are now beginning, tentatively, to seek a | | responsive ear. | | | | Brothers and sisters, parents and even wives who were simply | | never allowed full expression of their grief because of the | | fierce pressures of the time, are now coming forward, | | looking for someone who can help with their healing. | | | | We hear from children, now 15 - 25 years old, who are | | searching for bits and pieces of information they can | | assemble to help fill that empty place in their lives that | NAM VET Newsletter Page 86 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 | is the father they never knew well, if at all. And they want | | to talk to each other, to share their special needs and the | | unique experience of growing up with a father on the Wall. | | They understand each other all too well. | | | | Millions of Americans need to meet and talk because of the | | Wall, and only the Friends can help them. | | | | Initial discussions with many other national organizations | | whose work brings them into contact with Vietnam veterans | | and their loved ones have attested to the need for IN TOUCH | | and their willingness to help. | | | | Simply put, the Friends will draw on its special work at the | | Memorial, its acquired and available data bases and | | programs designed and integrated by Electronic Data Systems | | (EDS), and the commitment and concern of its volunteers to | | place people with a common association to a name on the Wall | | to be in voluntary communication with each other. | | | | From there, we will let human nature take its good course. | | And let the healing begin. | | | | The starting point for the data base will be the more than | | twenty thousand names of people who have requested name | | rubbings from our volunteers in Washington. Each will be | | contacted and given the opportunity to participate by being | | listed in the IN TOUCH central data base file. | | | | Confidentiality is the keyword to cooperation and IN TOUCH | | will respect the integrity of all lists and records. Lists | | will be unavailable for public use and will not be | | distributed for any commercial purpose. | | | | By its nature, IN TOUCH must reach far beyond the veterans | | community in order to be successful. With professional | | guidance, the Friends will develop a program of on-going | | articles and other coverage in major media markets, high- | | lighting the personal experiences of people as they are put | | "in touch." The International Vietnam Veterans Echo | | Conference via the Herndon Byte eXchange 1:109/316 node as | | the enter point for gathering and disseminating information | | will be used. Aside from bringing the program into public | | awareness, these articles and stories will serve as a val- | | uable tool for public education on a wealth of matters | | relating to the Vietnam era. | | | | As a preliminary test of the IN TOUCH project, the Friends | | has implemented a pilot project to test the design and | | demands of such a program. Several hundred requests with | | full background information have been entered into a system | | designed to match requestor data with the existing Memorial | | data. Even with such a small sample, limited data and a | | fairly unsophisticated cross-indexing system, matches have | | been made and IN TOUCH has produced its first real | | connections. The results have been as profoundly moving for | | the participants as expected. And as gratifying for the | | Friends. | | | NAM VET Newsletter Page 87 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 | But it was clear that the information management system and | | the supporting hardware system would have to be more power- | | ful and more complex in order to handle thousands, perhaps | | hundreds of thousands, of requests. Confidentiality of the | | system and information must be paramount. | | | | With well over 2,000 Vietnam veterans, Electronic Data | | Systems (EDS) became involved and has been generous in its | | assistance with designing the data management systems which | | will be critical to a successful program. The Friends have | | reached a three-year working agreement with EDS which | | promises continuity and maximum potential for success in | | building an information bank that can truly help people in | | their search for others who knew a loved one. | | | | The Friends are delighted that Bob Hope has agreed to make | | a public service announcement which we can use on radio and | | television to help get the word out to the public on the | | availability of the service. | | | | The Friends are also pleased to note that Hewlett Packard, | | Zenith Data Systems, Borland International, FASTCOMM | | Communications Corporation and the First National Bank of | | Chicago have all contributed computer equipment, computer | | software, and office equipment to the project, so they are | | beginning to feel fully functional. | | | | The Friends hear from people who have long been living with | | the pain of loss and looking for a way to heal. For | | instance, the Friends recently received a letter from a | | woman who wrote: | | | | Dear Friends: | | For quite some time I have been searching for a | | way to know my brother. It seems hopeless at times. | | I was 12 when he was killed... I had waited for the | | day he would come back to us. He never did. A part | | of me will always be 12 and continue to wait. | | Thank you for giving me hope that there may be | | a way to find him and bring him home to my heart..." | | | | + + + | | | | The Friends of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial | | Electronic Data Systems | | Herndon Byte eXchange TCOMMnet BBS 1:109/316 | | | |+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++| NAM VET Newsletter Page 88 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 Input by: Ray "Frenchy" Moreau NAM VETs IN-TOUCH Section Editor Herndon Byte eXchange - Herndon, VA (703) 471-8010 THIS FORM REQUIRES SIGNATURE FOR CONFIDENTIALITY RELEASE PLEASE READ BELOW ------------------------------------------------------------------ I wish to be IN TOUCH with (Please circle and/or comment) Family, Friends and/or Fellow Veterans of the following: __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ ----------- PERSON WHO DID NOT COME BACK FROM VIETNAM ------------ First Name_____________ Middle Name___________ Last Name__________ Relationship to You and/or Reason for Request (Answer as fully as possible)_____________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ ================================================================== -------- ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ABOUT HIM/HER - IF KNOWN --------- Rank_______ Birth Date ______________ Soc. Sec. # ________________ Tour Date of Birth _______________ Where Buried __________________ Branch of Service: AR__ NA__ AF__ MC__ CG__ RC__ CIV__ (Fill in his/her equivalent unit designations in the spaces below) Division ____________ Brigade ___________ Battalion ______________ Regiment ____________ Company ___________ Ship ___________________ Battles:__________________________________________________________ Locations:________________________________________________________ Nicknames:________________________________________________________ Hometown (while in Nam): ____________________ Home State: ________ ================================================================== ---------------------- INFORMATION ABOUT YOU --------------------- Title___ First Name ____________ Middle/Maiden Name _____________ Last Name ____________________ Address___________________________________________________________ City __________________________________ State ____ Zip: _____-____ Your Home Phone ( ) ____________ Work Phone: ( ) ____________ ---------------- IF YOU ARE A VIETNAM-ERA VETERAN ---------------- Tour date _______________________________ Rank __________________ Branch of Service: AR__ NA __ AF __ MC __ CG __ RC __ CIV __ Fill in your equivalent unit designations in the spaces below Division: __________ Brigade: ___________ Battalion: ___________ Regiment: __________ Company: ___________ Ship: ________________ Battles: _________________________________________________________ Locations: _______________________________________________________ Nicknames: _______________________________________________________ Hometown (when in VN) _______________________ Home State: ________ Comments: ________________________________________________________ CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT _____ I give permission to the Friends of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial to release my name, address, phone number and relationship to other participants in the IN TOUCH project NAM VET Newsletter Page 89 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 seeking information on the individual above (strike out phone number if you do not want it released). OR _____ I would like to have the names, addresses, and phone numbers of persons who knew my friend or relative, but prefer NOT to have my name, address, and phone number released. I hereby release the Friends of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial from any and all liability that may arise from the operation of the IN TOUCH project. Signature ____________________________________ Date _____________ NOTE: Do not electronically transmit this form, instead mail to: Friends of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial 1350 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Suite 300 Washington, DC 20036 ____________ ======= _________________/|_____... | | " === |_______________| |-----::: |._ - " ) |_|___| / / |___| /_/ NAM VET Newsletter Page 90 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 ================================================================== C o n c e n t r a t e d S e r v i c e ================================================================== NamVet/IVVEC Concentrated Service Report To keep you abreast of HOW NamVet/IVVEC Concentrated Service is doing, we'll try to run a report every month of the status of efforts currently underway and, if appropriate, apprise you of positive or negative results. -- Letter dated 1/1/90 to Massachusetts' DAV Commander, with text-file copy in IVVEC: To date: NO response - VERBAL or WRITTEN -- Copy of above letter dated 1/1/90 to DAV National Commander, with text-file copy in IVVEC: To date: NO response - VERBAL or WRITTEN -- Letter dated 1/13/90 to U.S. Congressman Silvio O. Conte, with text-file copy in IVVEC was received 3/26/90. Flurry of activity! -- Letter(s) dated 1/21/90 to Commissioners and Directors of Veterans Affairs in 50 states and 2 Territories, with text- file copy in IVVEC: To date: 24 positive and helpful responses w/literature; 7 letters returned ADDRESSEE NOT HERE UNABLE TO FORWARD We are now beginning to receive newsletters produced by the Veterans Departments of a few states! I will keep you posted here and in the VIETNAM_VETS echo as to continuing developments on any of the above issues. Yours, in Service to America ... and my fellow man In kindness, honesty, and good faith G. Joseph Peck Moderator, VIETNAM_VETERANS INTERNATIONAL ECHO Managing Editor, NAMVET SysOp - VETLINK #1 President, BERKSHIRE VETERANS' CENTER, INC. __________ \ IVVEC \ _____) SERVICE )_____ _________(____(________(______(@) ) ) / O O O O O O O O O/_/| /<> O O O O O O O O O/ | /MM O O O O O O O MM/ | / ___________ / . /O (___________) O O/. (====================( NAM VET Newsletter Page 91 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 ================================================================== I V V E C & N a m V e t - W H E R E ? ================================================================== The NAM VET Roll Call The following are the current locations where the NamVet newsletter and Annual editions are currently sent and, as I understand it, available for Bark/Wazoo File Requests. FidoNet & AlterNet Nodes: ------------------------ Scott McKnight 1:389/2001 Blytheville, Arkansas Todd Looney 1:143/27 San Jose, California Mike Nelson 1:125/20 Burlingame, California Greg Peters 1:103/232 La Mirada, California Sam Saulys 1:141/488 Branford, Connecticut John McCorkle 1:369/10 Fort Lauderdale, Florida Charles Harper 1:370/10 West Athens, Georgia Gene Clayton 1:161/414 Kauai, Hawaii Gordon Kaough 1:380/5 Lake Charles, LA Mort Sternheim 1:321/109 Amherst, Massachusetts G. Joseph Peck 1:321/203 Pittsfield, Massachusetts Pete Farias 1:321/210 Pittsfield, Massachusetts Vern Pero 1:321/212 Dalton, Massachusetts Jim Henthorn 1:261/1044 Baltimore, Maryland Bob Rudolph 1:261/0 Reisterstown, Maryland Wayne Parrish 1:308/20 Alamogordo, New Mexico Chuck Haynes 1:308/60 Alamogordo, New Mexico Mike Connealy 1:305/101 Las Cruces, New Mexico Kathleen Kelly 1:1033/0 Staten Island, New York Tom Mickus 1:480/114 Toronto, Ontario, Canada Bob Currie 1:105/204 Milwaukie, Oregon Luis Salazar 1:367/16 San Juan, P.R. Jerry Hindle 7:48/0 Stratford Heights, Tennessee Aaron Schmiedel 1:124/4106 Dallas, Texas Carrie Brown 1:130/10 Fort Worth, Texas Rick Edwards 1:106/113 Houston, Texas Bob Davis 1:106/116 Houston, Texas Art Fellner 1:106/437 Missouri City, Texas Ray Moreau 1:109/316 Herndon, Virginia Jim Barth 1:350/21 Brownsville, Washington Ralph Sims 1:350/341 Grapeview, Washington Other Nets: ---------- Martin Kroll MetroLink Chatsworth, GA Lefty Frizzell RelayNet Houston, Texas Ed Lucas QuickLink Houston, Texas Edward Green Shop Qbbs Exeter, NH (603)778-1698 Areas not covered: If *-YOUR-* BBS is in any of the areas listed below *-AND-* you have the NAM VET available for File Requests, please let us know your BBS (and SysOp) Name, its net/node number (if any), and its telephone number so that we might be able to direct a user in *- YOUR-* area to you. NAM VET Newsletter Page 92 Volume 4, Number 6 June 17, 1990 - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - Australian Continent - All European Continent - All Alabama Alaska Arizona Calgary, Canada Colorada Delaware Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Maine Minnesota Wisconsin Mississippi Missouri Connecticut Montana Nebraska New Jersey Nevada North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Pennsylvania South Carolina South Dakota Utah Vancouver, B.C Vermonts Washington, D.C. West Virginia Winnipeg, Canada Wyoming I'm going to be working on this list in an attempt to update it. If any of you know of an error, please address a message to me in the IVVEC echo and let me know. If you know of a system not listed above, also let me know, it'll save me some time and make for a more accurate list. Thanks for your help... Ciao for Niao - Todd - NamVet's Managing Editor -- #L.W. Jewell Moderator at the Veterans Information Site (veteran@cc.purdue.edu)# #& WWII-L Listowner: "Sunday's horoscope is note worthy because of its strange,# #sudden and wholly unpredictable and inexplicable occurrences, affecting all # #phases of life." "Your Horoscope" L.A. Evening Herald Express, Sat, 12/06/41 #