Veterans Memorial Fund Accomplished Its Mission ... and Pressed On

By Margaret Battistelli Gardner

"There was a generation gap, as well," he adds. "A lot of the people who were visiting The Wall weren't even alive when it was built. So we launched an education initiative."

That included a mobile museum, or "traveling wall," called The Wall That Heals, which takes the message of the memorial around the country. Later, spurred by visitors leaving everything from letters to dog tags to a bottle of Jack Daniels and even a Harley-Davidson motorcycle at The Wall, the organization launched a virtual memorial that allowed people to post remembrances online.