DES MOINES, Iowa- The 15th Annual Vietnam Veterans Recognition Day Ceremony will be held on  Friday, May 6th, 2022, at 11:00 a.m.  The ceremony will take place at the Iowa Vietnam Veterans Memorial, south of the Iowa State Capitol building.

The ceremony will be hosted by the Disabled American Veterans Chapter 20, along with the Des Moines VA Healthcare system.

“I lost a number of friends, that didn’t come home,” said Dan Gannon, a Vietnam Veteran who is organizing the event. “I have a number of friends that have died from Agent Orange diseases, presumptive illnesses, I myself had stage four cancer from Agent Orange and I was able to beat that,” said Gannon.

When Gannon beat Agent Orange, he decided to start giving back to Veteran’s organizations.

This year’s event will feature Col. Jim McClung, USMC ( retired). He is a native of Casey, Iowa had was on two tours of duty in Vietnam.

There will also be another speaker, Heath Yardage Lee, a former Des Moines resident who wrote “The League of Wives, the Untold Story of the Women Who Took on the US Government to Bring Their Husbands Home.” These were wives of American POW’s and MIA’s who kept advocating through media efforts to find and bring their loved-ones home.

“Today we welcome them all home with honor and gratitude,” said Gannon in a news release. “So not it is critical we not let this 50th Commemoration slip by without trying to right that wrong 50 years ago when America neglected to welcome home our millions of warriors.”

For more information about this ceremony on May 6th contact Dan Gannon: gannonbox@aol.com, 515-991-5257, or Karl Lettow, Public Information Officer for the Iowa Department of Veterans Affairs at Karl.lettow@iowa.gov, or call 515-727-3442.