Ken Remembers Memorial Day

Ken Mellick“I’m a Vietnam Veteran and am also with the Nam Knights Motorcycle Club. For the last seven years I’ve led our guys up to Washington D.C.’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial.  Like rolling thunder, we joined around three to four hundred thousand other bikers to pay tribute to those fallen heroes who paid the ultimate sacrifice. It’s been amazing going to the wall, the police memorials, and all that is up there. We went to honor those who served before us, who have helped us live in this Land of the Free – and because of the brave that paid that ultimate sacrifice.  This year I’m unable to go, but I send my prayers along with my brothers riding up, and to the families of those that have fallen.”
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is located near Constitution Gardens on the National Mall and northeast of the Lincoln Memorial. It honors members of the U.S. armed forces who fought in the Vietnam War, those who perished in Vietnam and South East Asia, and those missing in action. The memorial consists of three separate parts: the Three Soldiers statue, the Vietnam Women’s Memorial and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall, which is the most popular part of the memorial. The “wall” is actually made up of two identical walls that are each 246 feet and 9 inches long, and contain more than 58,000 names. According to the National Park Service, the memorial receives roughly 3 million visitors per year.