"Welcome Home" Event Planned for Vietnam Vets

The Department of Veterans Affairs and Central Connecticut State University Veterans History Project are organizing an official “Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans” event to be held Saturday, March 31 at 7 p.m. at the Governor William A. O'Neill Armory in Hartford. 

Approximately 80,000 men and woman currently living in Connecticut served in the military during the Vietnam era (February 1961 through May 1975). Last year, Connecticut was the second U.S. state to officially designate March 30 -- the day the last serviceman left Vietnam in 1973 -- as Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day. Several additional states have since followed suit.

“Since the legislation was passed, my office has been receiving inquiries about what, if anything, we were going to do to commemorate the day,” said Commissioner of Veterans’ Affairs Linda Spoonster Schwartz.  “In organizing this ‘Welcome Home,’ our mission is simple: let us give our Vietnam veterans a hearty ‘thank you’ and the enthusiastic welcome home many of them never received.”

Headlining the event will be the USO Liberty Bells, who will perform patriotic and Vietnam era songs. In addition to entertainment and food, it will prove to be a great evening for sharing stories, meeting other veterans and celebrating the men and women who served.

Committee members are raising private funds to support the event so that veterans will receive a free ticket for the event. Tickets for guests are $10.

Among the executive committee members planning and raising funds for the event are Nikki O’Neill, wife of the late Governor William O’Neill, Commissioner Schwartz, Eileen Hurst, director of CCSU’s Veterans History Project, and Vietnam Veterans Paul Bucha, US Army captain (retired) and a Medal of Honor recipient, and William J. Begert, four-star general of the U.S. Air Force (retired) who is Pratt & Whitney’s vice president for Military International Programs and Business. Begert will speak at the Welcome Home.

“We all hope the veterans will enjoy the camaraderie and, most of all, the show of support the Welcome Home event is meant to deliver,” Schwartz said. 

Event information is available at www.ccsu.edu/welcomehome. For tickets or donations, please contact: Eileen Hurst, 860-832-2976 or hursteim@ccsu.edu. To place an ad in the program booklet, contact Tammy Marzik at 860-616-3606.