Memorial in Washington DC
The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial is a memorial in Washington, D.C., which honors veterans of the armed forces of the United States who were permanently disabled during the course of their national service. Congress adopted legislation establishing the memorial on October 23, 2000, authorizing the Disabled Veterans for Life Memorial Foundation to design, raise funds for, and construct the memorial. The fundraising goal was reached in mid-2010 and ground for the memorial broken on November 10, 2010. The memorial was dedicated by President Barack Obama on October 5, 2014.
The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial is located on a triangular parcel bounded by 2nd Street SW, Washington Avenue SW, and the on-ramps from both streets to I-395. The site is adjacent to and east of the Hubert H. Humphrey Building, headquarters of the Department of Health and Human Services; adjacent to and northeast of the Thomas P. O'Neill, Jr. Federal Building; and southeast and adjacent to the Bartholdi Fountain portion of the grounds of the United States Botanic Garden. The site is federally owned and under the administrative jurisdiction of the National Park Service.
The memorial was designed by Michael Vergason of Michael Vergason Landscape Architects, with sculptor Larry Kirkland consulting. Architectural services were supplied by Shalom Baranes Associates, and engineering services by RK&amp;K Engineers. Technical assistance for the fountain and reflecting pool were provided by Fluidity, Inc. Technical assistance in graphic design was provided by Cloud Gehshan Associates, and consultant Claude Engle assisted with the lighting design.
Description.
The memorial consists of five elements:
Landscaping elements form an integral part of the memorial design. A row of ginkgo trees lines the side of the site west of the "Wall of Gratitude", as well as both sides of the wide sidewalk on the Washington Avenue side of the site. Planting beds approximately deep exist behind each glass wall. Ground cover consists of mondo grass and lily turf. Shrubs used at the site include Carolina allspice, dwarf sweet pepperbush, Harry's garnet sweetspire, "Gulftide" holly osmanthus, and Burkwood viburnum. Perennial plantings at the site include marginal wood fern, autumn fern, lenten rose, Virginia bluebell, and woodland sedge.
Most of the memorial is paved using a gray granite known in the stone trade as Virginia Mist. All paving stones were treated with a thermal coating to help them resist weatherization.
Perimeter lighting along city sidewalks bordering the site is provided by standard single- or double-globe D.C. standard streetlights. Metal halide lights illuminate the eastern side of the "Wall of Gratitude", the flagpole, and the memorial grove. LED lights are used to backlight each glass wall, and for under-lighting the granite benches at the site.
Origins.
Legislative approval.
In 1995, Lois Pope, widow of "National Enquirer" owner Generoso Pope Jr., met a disabled American veteran at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and realized there was no memorial in the city which honored disabled veterans. Although she did not know him, Pope called the office of Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jesse Brown to plead for a memorial. Pope called every day for the next six months, until finally Brown's secretary put her call through. Brown agreed to support legislation establishing a memorial. Because the Commemorative Works Act (CWA) of 1986 (P.L. 99-625) barred the expenditure of federal funds for memorials, a foundation needed to be established to oversee private fundraising. Brown introduced Pope to Art Wilson, the national adjutant (CEO) of the Disabled American Veterans (DAV), an organization founded in 1920 to assist disabled veterans. The DAV was itself not a nonprofit, and thus Pope and Wilson agreed that a new foundation, the Disabled Veterans for Life Memorial Foundation (DVLMF; also known as the Disabled Veterans' LIFE Memorial Foundation) should be created. Brown (who left office in 1997), Pope, and Wilson incorporated the foundation in 1998, and Wilson was named its president.
They and their supporters began lobbying Congress to win passage of the necessary federal legislation. The effort was announced on November 9, 1998. They received the support of Senators John McCain (R-Arizona), Max Cleland (D-Georgia), and John Kerry (D-Massachusetts), who introduced legislation authorizing a memorial in January 1999 (106th Congress). Companion legislation was introduced in the House of Representatives by Representative John Murtha (D-Pennsylvania).
The CWA proved to be an obstacle for the memorial foundation, as it barred construction of any memorial on the National Mall or its immediate environs unless 25 years had passed since the event, or the last surviving member of the group had died. Exemptions could be made for events or individuals of singular importance or long-lasting historic significance. That exemption could only be issued by the National Capital Memorial Commission (NCMC). The memorial foundation sought just such an exemption, but in November 1999 the NCMC denied the exemption. Veterans groups were outraged, and Pope declared that "bureaucracy" was standing in the way of honoring people who had "taken a bullet" for the nation. The NCMC defended its decision, pointing out that Congress enacted the law to slow the rapid proliferation of memorials on the Mall. The agency also noted that there were already many memorials to veterans and to several wars on the National Mall. Since very little space remained for memorials, what was left should be kept open for future generations, NCMC officials argued.
In the wake of this decision, the legislation's backers in Congress quickly added new language to their bill exempting the memorial from the CWA's National Mall ban. The National Park Service (NPS) and the Department of the Interior now opposed the legislation because of this exemption. But Congress quickly approved the bill, and President Bill Clinton signed it into law (Public Law 106–348) on October 24, 2000.
Most of the rules of the CWA still applied to the disabled veterans memorial, however. The memorial foundation was required to raise enough private funds to design and build the memorial, and an amount equal to 10 percent of the memorial's construction cost also needed to be raised and placed in a trust fund for the memorial's maintenance and operation. The CWA gave the foundation seven years to begin construction, or its authorization would expire.
Site selection.
The first site selected by the memorial foundation was disapproved. The foundation asked for a site within the Reserve, an area which included the National Mall and its immediate surroundings. On January 16, 2001, the NCMC voted 6-to-0 (with one abstention) to deny approval for a memorial anywhere in the Reserve. Foundation executives were angered. Jesse Brown, now executive director of the foundation, said the NCMC was declaring that "2.3 million disabled veterans are not good enough" to be on the Mall. Lois Pope took issue with the NCMC's conclusion that the memorial was not of lasting importance or historic significance, arguing, "We wouldn't have freedom if it wasn't for these men and women." Two weeks after the ruling, "The Washington Times" published an editorial by Art Wilson which attacked the NCMC's decision. The DVLMF considered asking Congress to overturn the NCMC's ruling, but decided against doing so. Extensive controversy surrounded the decision of the World War II Memorial's advisory board to seek an exemption for its memorial, which led to expensive lawsuits and significantly delayed its construction. "We [didn't] want to go down that road," said Brown.
Following the siting guidelines and maps provided by the NCMC, the DVLMF looked at more than 50 potential memorial sites throughout the National Capital Area. Foundation leaders worked closely with D.C. government officials to identify a site. Ten sites were short-listed by the city and foundation, although the DVLMF only seriously considered six of these. The District pushed for the memorial to be located in an existing park-like triangle of land bounded by Washington Avenue SW, C Street SW, and 2nd Street SW, southwest from the United States Botanic Garden's Bartholdi Fountain Park and less than two blocks from the United States Capitol. The site was man-made, built using air rights when the tunnel carrying Interstate 395 was constructed from 1965 to 1973. The lot was city-owned, but the city was willing to transfer it to the NPS. Robert Hansen, the foundation's chief operating officer, praised D.C. officials for their assistance. Lois Pope personally agreed to the site selection. Key considerations were the site's proximity to Capitol Hill, the museums of the Smithsonian Institution, and Washington Metro subway stations. The foundation submitted its site selection report to NCMC in August 2001.
On August 30, NCMC voted unanimously to approve the memorial foundation's preferred site on Washington Avenue SW. NCMC gave active consideration to six of the sites proposed by the foundation. District of Columbia officials strongly supported the preferred site in their testimony before the commission. D.C. officials expressed concern about the number of pedestrians crossing 2nd Street SW to the east and Independence Avenue SW to the north to reach the memorial and the weight of the planned memorial. The man-made below-ground structure supporting the existing parkland and streets was not designed to carry a heavy granite or bronze memorial, nor the weight of a fountain. They cautioned that the District of Columbia supported the preferred site only because they understood that the memorial would consist of a garden rather than sculpture or a monument. City officials, however, pledged to work with memorial designers to overcome these problems. Brown testified that the DVLMF supported the site because it had a direct line of sight with the Capitol, and would remind members of Congress of their weighty responsibilities when considering issues of war and peace.
The memorial site also required approval from the National Capitol Planning Commission (NCPC) and the Commission of Fine Arts (CFA). But no significant opposition was expected from either body, since representatives from both agencies served on the National Capital Memorial Commission. Both quickly approved the site as well.
The memorial foundation said its proposed memorial would cost $35 million in August 2001. If design approval and fundraising went as expected, the foundation said it would begin construction by spring 2005.
Fundraising and extension of deadline.
Early fundraising efforts.
Section 10(b) of the Commemorative Works Act limited the legislative authorization for memorials to seven years unless otherwise specified. A memorial's site and design must be approved; the memorial foundation must show that art, architectural, and historic preservationists were consulted in the memorial's design and siting; contracts for construction must be signed; and sufficient funds to complete construction of the memorial must be in hand before the seven-year deadline was reached. In 2003, Congress relaxed this standard slightly. The Secretary of the Interior or the Administrator of the General Services Administration, in consultation with NCMC, had the discretion to issue a construction permit if both the NCPC and CFA had issued final (not preliminary) design approval and the foundation had 75 percent of the construction funds in hand. Furthermore, Section 8(b) of the Commemorative Works Act required that each memorial foundation raise an amount equal to 10 percent of the total construction cost, and to deposit these monies into a trust fund administered by the Department of the Interior to pay for the cost of perpetual maintenance and preservation of the work.
The foundation did not begin fundraising until August 2002. Just how much money the foundation needed was unclear, with some sources claiming $35 million but others $60 million. One of the first fundraising efforts involved the sale of a gold-plated commemorative medallion priced at $29.95 each. To urge the public to donate, Pope herself paid for advertisements which featured General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, poet Maya Angelou, and National Football League star Michael Strahan. On Veterans Day in 2002, the Lois Pope LIFE Foundation donated $2 million to the project. The same day, the Disabled American Veterans said its chapters would also begin fundraising for the memorial. Shortly thereafter, the DVLMF launched a direct mail fundraising effort as well.
By 2004 the memorial's cost was still being pegged by the DVLMF at $60 million. About $20 million was budgeted for restoring C Street SW to its traditional east–west alignment so that a unified plot of land could be created for the memorial.
The DVLMF contracted with Tom Brokaw, former NBC News anchor and author of "The Greatest Generation" (1998), to host a fundraiser in New York City in April 2004, and the estate of Jesse Brown (who died in 2002) agreed to donate the proceeds of Brown's book "The Price of Their Blood: Profiles in Spirit"