The North Wall: Canada's Vietnam Memorial
Near Detroit, Michigan
Across the river from Detroit, on the Windsor waterfront directly beneath the Ambassador Bridge, stands a black granite wall honoring a group of veterans their own government refused to acknowledge. An estimated thirty thousand Canadians volunteered to serve in Vietnam, most by crossing into the United States and enlisting directly. One hundred and seventy-three of them died.
When American veterans Ric Gidner and Ed Johnson tried to get the Canadian Parliament to fund a memorial in Ottawa, a bill failed to pass in nineteen ninety-four. So they maxed out their credit cards, liquidated their retirement savings, and took out second mortgages to build it themselves. The North Wall was dedicated on July second, nineteen ninety-five.
It stands fourteen feet wide and eleven feet tall, weighing three tons, looking straight across at the country where those Canadians chose to fight.
