A Simple Coincidence?

Larry Gene Russell was killed in action during the Vietnam War. The older brother of two girls who were the friends of two of my sisters, I only knew of Larry by what I overheard Cindy and Linda telling my sisters back in the 1970s.

I separated from the US Air Force in November of 1987, after my four-year obligation, and I out-processed at McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey. When I had been stationed in Montana, I had made friends with a local who, by 1987, was living and chasing her dream in Washington, D.C. When my out-processing was finished, I hopped on a plane to D.C. to spend a week with my friend. As CJ had to work during the day, I was on my own to explore the city, and one day I found myself at the Vietnam War Memorial. Since the only personal knowledge I had of someone killed in that conflict was Larry Russell, I decided to look up his name. I found it on the alphabetical listing, which guided me to the panel where his name is and, in short time, I found it and took a photograph of it.

Photo taken in November, 1987. Negative scanned by Mrs. Farrago June 2, 2007.

Later, surmising that his elderly mother had never been to the Wall, I gave the photo to my sister who was closest to the Russell family, and she brought it to Mrs. Russell. The woman cried, thanked my sister, and told her to thank me for the kind gesture. I was happy that my thought was considered thoughtful.

Last week, twenty years later, I was again in Washington, D.C., this time shooting high-definition video of the many various awesome sights the city offers among its buildings and monuments and memorials. Yours truly across the Tidal Basin from the Jefferson Memorial. (Photo by R. Haag.)

On Wednesday morning my producer and I were at the Vietnam War Memorial trying to get stirring shots of the wall in the long beams of the early morning sun. Larry Russell was a fuzzy thought as I worked, a mere recollection of the photo I had taken, and what I had done with it afterward. I couldn’t even have remembered his first name had someone asked me. I certainly couldn’t remember where his name was, though my recollection was that it was somewhere up high.

Here I am, doing my thing at the Vietnam War Memorial. This shot gives a good idea of the density of names engraved in the granite. (Photo by R. Haag.)

Satisfied that I had gotten some useful video footage, we decided to leave. As we walked along the wall, almost to the end of the eastern leg, I casually glanced at the wall …and there he was: LARRY GENE RUSSELL! My eyes locked directly on his name, about belt-high on one of the shorter slabs of approximately shoulder height. It was so quick that it took a second to register in my brain. But then I looked at my co-worker and said, “Oh my god!”

I explained to her what had just happened and, in my shock, and the casualness with which I had glanced at the wall, I momentarily couldn’t find his name again. Anyone who’s never visited the Vietnam War Memorial may have difficulty understanding why I was so shocked – why I continue to be shocked – about this; the Vietnam War Memorial is a series of granite slabs ranging consecutively from one foot high to ten feet high to one foot high, standing on end, side-by-side with the names of every American killed in the Vietnam War engraved in them.

(Photo by R. Haag.)

There are more than 58,000 names, an inch tall or less, arranged chronologically by the date of their reported death, and then alphabetically as they appeared on that day’s report. Arranged as they are, the 58,000 names require roughly 100 yards of granite. (Photo from Google Images)

The odds against a person who knows only one name on that wall and casually glancing randomly at the wall while walking past it and seeing that name must be astronomical!

It would be an understatement to say that I had goosebumps. The air temperature was already above 80 degrees Fahrenheit by that hour, and I had chills!

My co-worker helped me find Larry's name again, and shortly a park ranger approached and asked us if he could answer any questions for us. I told him what I had just experienced, and he said, “That sort of thing happens a lot here.”

I can’t help but think that Larry was just saying, “Hi.”

Or, perhaps, “Thanks.”