Summary Of Always To Remember: The Vietnam Memorial By Brent Ashabranner

There were around 60,000 fallen or missing soldiers in the Vietnam War. All of the soldiers who survived were treated harshly by the ones they thought were their friends and family. Years later, the soldiers who served in the war were recognized once and for all by a twenty-one year old college student, named Maya Ying Lin. She was the winner of the design competition for the Vietnam War Memorial, the one which stands in Washington DC today. The event was very significant to American history, a story which an author wrote about. This writer picked a meaningful title for his article as well. Brent Ashabranner, the author, chose “Always to Remember: The Vision of Maya Ying Lin” as the title of his article, because it was to remember the fallen soldiers in the Vietnam War with the memorial he described, and to give an understanding of how the designer, Maya Lin, pictured her design for the memorial.

As contest rules in the article stated, it was a requirement to have all names of the fallen and missing soldiers on the memorial. When the winner was decided and it was constructed, visitors and family passed and watched the memorial, which was designed as a long wall of engravings. Some put their hand on their relative’s name; some even left gifts and souvenirs. Judges of the contest had remarked that “The designer has created an eloquent place where the simple meeting of earth, sky, and remembered names contain messages for all who will know this place.” Writing about a memorial, the author noted that the winning design was the most significant and contained memorable messages, which make people remember about the soldiers of the Vietnam