Upcoming vigil honors Vietnam War
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War, making Utah State University’s annual Veterans Day POW/MIA Vigil a highly significant event for students in the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, or ROTC.
The vigil is a 24-hour ceremony where members of the ROTC take hour-long shifts of silence to guard the flags. This year it will be held on Thursday, Nov. 9, due to Veterans Day taking place on a Saturday. The vigil will start at 5 p.m. on the Quad and go until 5 p.m. the following day.
The event is held to honor prisoners of war, as well as soldiers missing in action. Each hour of the vigil will be dedicated to members of those groups that fought specifically in the Vietnam War.
USU senior Capt. Wesley Mason is a flight commander with the ROTC, and he will be participating during one of the shifts for the vigil.
“It’s special every year because it’s really time for us to remember people who have fought and lost their lives for our country,” Mason said. “We’re doing this for real people.”
This year’s vigil is different from those in the past because each hour of the vigil will be dedicated to POWs or MIAs specifically from the Vietnam War. USU alumni are invited to come as well as all students.
With the vigil taking place on the Quad, a place frequented by passing students, professors and alumni, it can be witnessed by a majority of the Logan campus population.
“If a random student was just walking by, what I would want them to get out of it, is I would want them to be reminded that freedom isn’t free,” Mason said.
Evelyn Anderson, a senior studying mechanical engineering, is the ROTC cadet recruiting squadron commander. She shared why she joined the ROTC.
“I joined to continue on kind of like a legacy that was started by my grandfather. He himself went to the ROTC here on campus, and then he served in the Korean War, so I just kind of wanted to carry on that kind of legacy,” Anderson said. “I also just kind of wanted to find something that was bigger than myself.”
Anderson will be a part of the color guard detail that brings the flags out at 5 p.m. when the vigil starts, and she will also be taking part in a rifle shift later in the early morning.
Anderson said she thinks USU students should care about this event, “Because it’s something that many people put their lives towards.”
“This is a way that we can show our respect, in a very simple way, with just taking an hour out of our own time,” Anderson said.
For those not in the ROTC that want to share their gratitude for POW, MIA or any military service member, Anderson and Mason both noted that simply attending and taking a moment of silence is the best way to show gratitude at this vigil.
Friday, Nov. 10 will be filled with other events for bystanders to attend while the vigil is occurring. This includes a 2-mile military cadence run starting at Aggie Boulevard at 7 a.m., along with a commemoration event at 11:30 a.m. in the TSC where President Cantwell will speak.