Lake Charles' Lakefront Memorial Is Officially Louisiana's Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Under Sen. Jeremy Stine's Act 760

By Staff @ Bayou Weekly

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Veterans Memorial Park on the Lake Charles lakefront is the official Louisiana Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Act 760 of 2024, by state Sen. Jeremy Stine of Lake Charles, wrote that designation into state law, and the memorial lists the names of 885 Louisiana servicemembers who died in the war.

Stine, a Republican, represents Senate District 27. His official Senate page lists Calcasieu as the parish he represents, a district office on Broad Street in Lake Charles and 2021 as the year he was elected. It also shows him chairing the Senate's Judiciary B committee. He was the primary author of Senate Bill 245 in the 2024 regular session.

The law itself is one sentence long. It adds a section to the state-symbols part of Louisiana law saying the Vietnam Veterans Memorial at Veterans Memorial Park in Lake Charles "is hereby designated as the 'Louisiana Vietnam Veterans Memorial'." Gov. Jeff Landry signed it on June 19, 2024, and it took effect that day, according to the Legislature's bill history.

The bill drew no opposition on the record. The Senate passed it 37-0 on March 26, 2024. The House Municipal, Parochial and Cultural Affairs Committee reported it favorably 10-0, and the full House passed it 89-0 on May 23. Eight other senators and 18 House members signed on as co-authors.

The designation came first. The city announced that its Mayor's Armed Forces Commission would unveil the new memorial on Saturday, March 29, 2025, at the end of the commission's annual National Vietnam War Veterans Day ceremony. That observance falls each year on March 29, the anniversary of the withdrawal of the last U.S. combat troops from Vietnam in 1973. KPLC reported the unveiling that weekend and said the memorial was created in part because of Stine's legislation. The station said the $150,000 monument was being paid for with corporate and individual donations. The city's list of supporters includes veterans' groups such as American Legion Post 1 and Vietnam Veterans of America Chapter 1098.

The American Press has described the three-sided memorial as the second one in Lake Charles built for those who died in Vietnam. In a 2025 look back, the paper recalled that the Young Men's Business Club dedicated a Vietnam Conflict Memorial on the lakefront on Nov. 9, 1968. It was a 120-foot tower holding 46 aluminum purple martin houses with 1,116 nesting compartments. "Purple martins are a peace bird," Gene Dolan, the club's project chairman, told the newspaper. "With the Vietnam War, everybody wanted peace so we gave them birds." Hurricane Rita destroyed the tower in 2005, and the city formed what is now Veterans Memorial Park on the site.

The city places Veterans Memorial Park on Lakeshore Drive, on the north side of the Lake Charles Event Center grounds. It describes the memorial as "a place of reflection, remembrance, and gratitude for veterans, family members, and visitors alike."

The park will be busy this week. The city's annual Veterans Day Celebration is set for Wednesday, Nov. 11, at 10 a.m. at Veterans Memorial Park, hosted by the Mayor's Armed Forces Commission. The city says Cmdr. Daniel Burke of the U.S. Coast Guard Marine Safety Unit will speak, the Lake Charles Community Band will play a tribute to each branch of the military, and the Washington-Marion High School JROTC will present the colors.

The legislator series has covered the Purple Star designation for colleges that serve military students and Youth and Veterans Waterfowl Day as well. More state stories are in Top News.

Photo: SP5 Robert C. Lafoon, U.S. Army / National Archives, via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain (resized). Soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division at a mountaintop observation post near Tam Ky, Vietnam, Sept. 16, 1967; archival photo, not the Lake Charles memorial.