A real estate developer and retired university history professor, Westphall’s life work changed in May 1968, when his Marine son Victor David Westphall III was killed in an ambush in Vietnam.
Within days, Westphall started building a hilltop memorial to his son in Angel Fire in northern New Mexico. It got bigger when he received his son’s life insurance proceeds, and was expanded to memorialize all the American dead from the war. The Vietnam National Veterans Memorial, which is open 24 hours a day, was dedicated on the third anniversary of his son’s death. It was designed as “a national symbol of the sacrifices of Vietnam veterans and a source of inspiration for the pursuit of a peaceful world,” Westphall once said.
“It was the first national memorial for Vietnam vets,” said a Vietnam vet friend who helped raise funds for the project. “He beat the government to the punch by 10 years.” Westphall died July 22 in his apartment at the memorial. He was 89.
Author’s Note: A year or so before I wrote this, I was driving home from New Mexico to Colorado when I saw a sign for the memorial on the rural highway we happened to be on. We stopped, and I’m glad we did: I had never even heard of the place before, and I thought Angel Fire was the most appropriate name possible for the site. “I’d love to see this memorial funded into perpetuity,” Westphall had said. “I just continue to have faith that it will carry on long after I am gone.” His faith was well placed: the State of New Mexico took over the site and continues to maintain it.