First Pictures: Fifth Anniversary Of Invasion Of Iraq Vigil Held In Glens Falls
Wednesday, March 19th, was the fifth anniversary of the United States' invasion of Iraq and Democracy For The Greater Glens Falls Area held yet another vigil for peace and to bring our troops home.

One thing was different this time: members read all of the names of the American dead aloud-- almost 4,000, starting with those from New York and Vermont, which were read by themselves. The effect was sobering and very powerful and all present were clearly moved, some to tears. It took almost 45 minutes, even with the names of those lost in each year of the war being read simultaneously in a form of counter point.

We were particularly privileged to have Frank Grassia, who taught Pfc. Nathan Brown at South High, read Nathan Brown's name along with those of the fallen from New York and Vermont.

We were also grateful for the news coverage by the Post Star, WNYT-13 and TV-8, both of which did major news reports. The WNYT report lead coverage for the entire Capital District region of NY, with about a million people.

All photos courtesy Dick Dudley.



Frank Grassia begins reading the names of the lost.


Shot with Canon PowerShot S3 IS at 2008-03-20

Co-organizer Kate Austin reads more names.



Kathy Sonnabend reads lists of dates of major Iraq loss of life.


Shot with Canon PowerShot S3 IS at 2008-03-20

2006 was the year with the greatest number of casualties and took the longest to read. At the end there was a moment of silence and Taps was played.

Labels: Democracy For America, Democracy For The Greater Glens Falls Area, DFA, Dick Dudley, Iraq, Iraq War, vigil

- posted by Larry Dudley @ 10:00 PM