About the 3417 Project
The Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument is a permanent honor to all Texans who served in the Vietnam War – and it is also a permanent memorial to the 3,417 Texans who never came home. This memorial is made through The 3417 Project, a personalized tribute by the Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument Committee to honor and remember each Texan who died or is unaccounted for in Vietnam.
The Dog Tags
Each of the 3,417 Texans killed or missing in Vietnam is individually represented on two hand-embossed dog tags. One set of these Texas Hero Tags is encased in a vintage ammunition can entombed inside the Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument. A duplicate set is displayed for the public in the Texas Vietnam Heroes Exhibit. The Exhibit can be seen at the Museum of the American Gi.
Marine Corps veteran Don Dorsey, a member of the monument committee, hand embossed the tags with the assistance of fellow veteran James Hart, also a Marine. Each tag is marked with the Texas serviceman’s name, rank, branch of service, date of loss and home of record.
Click Here to Access the 3417 Database Click Here to Order a Hero Tag Honoring Your Texas Vietnam HeroGroundbreaking Ceremony
Ground was broken for the Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument on March 25, 2013 in a ceremony attended by more than one thousand people. The ceremony focused on honoring the 3,417 Texans who died or are unaccounted for in Vietnam by dedicating the dog tags remembering each of them for entombment in the monument.
Reading of the Names
On March 24, 2013, the Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument conducted a Reading of the Names of the 3,417 Texans who died or are unaccounted for in the Vietnam War. More than 110 volunteers participated in the historic tribute at the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library in Austin.
The Texas Vietnam Heroes Exhibit
The Texas Vietnam Heroes Exhibit is an integral part of The 3417 Project, a personalized tribute by the Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument to honor and remember every Texan who died in the Vietnam War. Two dog tags were hand-embossed with the name, rank, branch of service, date of loss and home of record of each Texan who made the ultimate sacrifice while serving in the American Armed Forces during Vietnam. One of each tag is displayed in the Texas Vietnam Heroes Exhibit. The second is entombed in the Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument.
The exhibit invites visitors to ponder the magnitude of Texan sacrifice in Vietnam through a display of 3,417 tags – additionally, two blank tags honor Texans known only to God who died in Vietnam. The tags hang together in alphabetical order so people can easily find individual names using the guides at the top and the panels at the base.
The Texas Hero tags hang freely on their chains, inviting visitor interaction. Texas Vietnam veteran Don Dorsey, who hand-embossed the tags, wanted people to be able to touch the tags, and purposefully chose a reflective surface for the tags so that the play of light and color would bring life to this stunning and personal tribute.
The Texas Vietnam Heroes Exhibit made its debut on March 24, 2013 at the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library in Austin. The exhibit opening accompanied the Texas Capitol Vietnam Veterans Monument Reading of the Names event held as part of the monument’s groundbreaking ceremonies. Accompanied by a Patriot Guard motorcycle honor guard, it then went on a 3,000-mile tour of the state, with exhibitions at –
- The Institute of Texan Cultures, San Antonio
- Edison Plaza, Beaumont
- The Texas Tech Museum, Lubbock
- The Museum of Health, Houston
- Cavanaugh Flight Museum, Addison
- The U.S.S. Lexington Museum, Corpus Christi
- The Texas State Capitol, Austin
- The 12th Armored Division Memorial Museum, Abilene
- The Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum, Austin
- The Bertha Voyer Memorial Library, Honeygrove
The Texas Vietnam Heroes Exhibit will open May 2, 2105 at its permanent home at the Museum of the American GI in College Station.
