November 9, 2004 in City

Volunteers set up memorial so casualties of war are not forgotten

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POCATELLO, Idaho – Volunteers have turned a school football field into a symbolic cemetery called the Field of Heroes and begun a four-day vigil in preparation for Veterans Day 2004.

“Just appreciate these are our guys who have died, and we’re not going to forget them,” said John Rogers, a Vietnam veteran who helped hammer the hundreds of crosses into the ground behind Irving Middle School.

Volunteers are camping on the grounds to keep any vandals out before Thursday’s ceremonies that will include local dignitaries and members of the family of Pfc. Jerrick Petty. The 25-year-old soldier from Idaho Falls was killed last Dec. 10, in an attack as he guarded a gasoline station in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

Rogers and others took all day Sunday to painstakingly place white wooden crosses exactly three feet apart in straight rows six feet from each other. American flags fly along the sidelines.

The first 143 each bear the name of a soldier killed in Afghanistan and take up the southern five yards of the field. The other 95 yards contain crosses — and names — for those killed in Iraq — 1,128 and counting. Rogers knows the numbers exactly. Blank crosses are ready to include any soldiers killed this week.

Irving teacher Raejean Cates and her husband, Mark, assembled the crosses from donated wood and paint over the last three weeks.

Angy Cook was working with Rogers Sunday morning when several Marines arrived to place emblems on the crosses of the 275 Marines who have died.

“They said, ‘Oh my gosh! I didn’t realize there were so many,’ ” Cook recalled. “They cried, and I gave them a big hug.”

Eight larger crosses bear the name and story of the Idaho soldiers killed so far in the war.

“These are top-flight kids,” Rogers said. “I am proud that they’re serving the country the way that they are. You would be proud to know every one of them.

“We’re not bemoaning the dead,” he said. “We want to say everyone in Afghanistan and Iraq is of that same quality. We want to teach these school kids that.”

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