Roll Call For Vietnam Wall Not Over Yet Seven More Names Deemed Worthy After Deaths Traced To War Injuries

An artisan painstakingly carved the name of William W. Di Niro on Tuesday, the last of seven more men remembered on the black granite wall of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial years after their deaths.

The addition this week of the names brought back to family members painful memories of their loved ones. It also filled them with joy and pride.

“It’s too bad it took so long, but I am glad,” said Linette Sparacino, sister of veteran Charles Wood, an Army pilot from Roseburg, Ore., who died 15 years ago.

“It’s a nice memorial, better than a verbal kind of ceremony where the words float in the air and they are gone,” added Sparacino, of Alexandria, Va., by telephone.

The additions bring the total number of names on the memorial to 58,209.

Family members of the seven were not invited to watch Jim Lee and Kirk Bochman inscribe the names, a procedure that involves plastering the stenciled names on the wall and then sandblasting them in place.

But they will attend a ceremony on Memorial Day to honor the veterans: Pfc. Harrison Allen of Springfield, Ill.; Staff Sgt. Robert Shockey of Phoenix; Spc. Edward Tibbetts of West Southport, Maine; Spc. Kenneth Duggar of Chicago; Master Sgt. Herbert Murff of Caruthersville, Mo.; Chief Warrant Officer Wood; Spc. Di Niro of Seldon, N.Y.

Officials said it took so long to include the names partly because some family members did not inform the Pentagon of the deaths but mostly because determining what constitutes a death as a direct result of the Vietnam War is a time-consuming process.

Sparacino said Wood was shot in the stomach, broke his neck, his back, one arm, both legs, six ribs and received 156 stitches after his plane was shot down June 13, 1970.

Wood survived the crash, but was in and out of hospitals the rest of his life with complications.

He died in 1982 after emergency gall bladder surgery. Although Wood’s surgeon verified on the death certificate that he died as a direct result of his wounds, Wood’s family was initially told that soldiers who were discharged from hospitals before their deaths could not have their names on the wall, Sparacino said.

After making a formal application to the Pentagon for inclusion, Sparacino succeeded.