By Roxanne Roberts
Washington Post Staff Writer
Washington’s first memorial honoring women in the military was hoisted into place on a granite foundation near the Vietnam Veterans Memorial yesterday morning with a handful of curious joggers and dutiful reports in attendance.
The official unveiling of the Vietnam Women’s Memorial is set for Veterans Day, Nov. 11.
After 10 years of planning and controversy -- and a three-week tour across the country -- the 2,000-pound bronze statue was lifted by crane from a truck bed and positioned at its permanent site in a grove of trees about 300 feet in front of the Wall.
"Female medical workers in Vietnam also bore the intensity and carnage of the war," the memorial’s spokeswoman, Mary Beth Newkumet, said. "Three hundred fifty thousand wounded soldiers went through their hospitals, airplanes and ships. Thousands died with a nurse beside them – she was the last person many of them saw. Many thousands more were saved because of quick, effective medical care."
The 6-foot-8-inch-high statue, covered in canvas until next week, depicts four figures: a nurse holding a wounded male soldier, a woman looking skyward is if in anticipation of a rescue helicopter, and another on her knees holding a helmet and looking at the ground in despair. While all the figures are wearing fatigues, sculptor Glenna Goodacre deliberately included no identifying insignia, to symbolically include all the women – military, medical and even civilian volunteers – who served in Vietnam.
"When the veterans see it, they can say, ‘That was me,’ said Goodacre, 54, who has been sculpting for 20 years. "They can see themselves in any of the three women."
The memorial was funded by private donations -- $4 million has been raised since it was first proposed in 1983. Project organizers are not releasing the cost of the sculpture itself.
Although the Vietnam Veterans Memorial includes the names of the eight military women who died during that conflict, Diane Carlson Evans, the founder of the Vietnam Women’s Memorial Project Inc., felt there should be recognition for the surviving women. Although there are no exact records by sex, an estimated 11,000 female military, medical and other workers served in Vietnam.
A second memorial, honoring all women who have ever served in the U.S. military, is being planned for the entrance of Arlington Cemetery.
Evans, an Army nurse stationed in Vietnam in 1968-69, first got the idea when she saw the realistic statue of the three servicemen by Frederick Hart that was added to Maya Lin’s original memorial design in 1984.
That statue was erected amid protest by Lin and others who believed it spoiled the original design of the Wall. The call to add yet another statue to the site set off a debate about how many separate groups should be honored with memorials.
"I think the Wall itself is a brilliant design," said Goodacre. "When they added the figures of the servicemen, but left the women out, it left a gap."
While veterans groups and officials argued the merits of additional memorials, the first proposed design for the women's’ memorial was rejected by the Fine Arts Commission.
In 1988 Congress passed legislation that approved a women’s memorial, and a nationwide design competition was held. Two years later, two entries were selected as winners, with the idea to combine them into one finished statue. That plan proved unworkable, and ultimately the design submitted by Goodacre, who got an honorable mention in the competition, was selected.
Yesterday, Evans and Goodacre were on hand to see it finally placed in its permanent home. The statue left Goodacre’s Sante Fe, N.M., studio in August and traveled across the country on a three-week, 21-city tour that ended in Crystal City on Sept. 20. The memorial was stored until yesterday.
"For the women veterans and volunteers who have been involved in this," said Newkumet, "it’s been a long, hard 10 years. This was a very exciting moment."