Posted on: Saturday, March 5, 2005
Memorial pays tribute to 48 killed in Iraq
By Karen Blakeman
Advertiser Staff Writer
The Hawai'i Pacific War Memorial at Marine Corps Base Hawai'i, dedicated to "all who have served and continue to serve our great nation," grew a little larger yesterday.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser Twenty-seven of the bricks commemorate Hawai'i-based Marines and a sailor killed in a helicopter crash in Iraq on Jan. 26. The twenty-one others bear the names of other Marines killed in action in Iraq.
Alice T. Clark, chairwoman of the Pacific War Memorial Association, said the first 20 bricks were purchased by Patrick Brent, a former Marine who donated $2,000 to make sure the Hawai'i-based Marines and those from Hawai'i who were killed in action in Iraq were represented at the memorial.
Clark said she purchased the other 28 bricks — those bearing the names of the Marines and sailor killed in the helicopter crash and one bearing the name of Lance Cpl. Sean P. Maher, who was killed near Fallujah on Feb. 2 — after learning that the Marines and spouses of the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines were collecting money to pay for them.
The 1st Battalion donations also included extra money for bricks for Marines from that unit who may be killed in the future, Clark said as she opened the envelope containing the donation yesterday.
"Oh, this makes me want to cry," she said, as she totaled and re-totaled the checks collected by the Marines and spouses.
The total raised, she said, was $7,913.95.
Maher and the 26 Marines and sailor killed in the Jan. 26 crash will be honored Monday in a separate service at the State Capitol. The 1 p.m. ceremony will include remarks by Gov. Linda Lingle and Lt. Gen. Wallace C. Gregson, commander of all Marines in the Pacific and Middle East.
Individuals may purchase bricks bearing the names of people they would like to honor by contacting the Pacific War Memorial Association, Clark said. Proceeds go to the association, which plans to develop an educational center. A donation of $100 buys one engraved brick.
For information, call 533-3759 or go to www.pacificwarmemorial.org.
Reach Karen Blakeman at 535-2430 or kblakeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.
Forty-eight bricks, each bearing the name of a Marine who died in Iraq, and one bearing the name of a sailor, were among those added to a growing circle beneath the statue of Iwo Jima's flag-raising.
Robert Tampos of Fischer Tile installs bricks inscribed with the names of 48 Marines and a sailor who died in Iraq, at the Pacific War Memorial in Kane'ohe.
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| Marine Cpl. Alexander Velazquez stands near the brick bearing the name of his friend, Lance Cpl. Brian Medina, who was killed in Iraq in November.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser |
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| Alice Clark, chairwoman of the Pacific War Memorial Association, paid for 28 of the 48 bricks added to the memorial yesterday. The bricks, bearing the names of 27 people killed in a helicopter crash in Iraq, and one bearing the name of a Marine killed in Fallujah, cost $100 apiece.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser |
