San Antonio vets revive deteriorated South Side memorial
Vietnam veteran Gene Riojas, 82, was upset the first time he saw the veterans memorial garden at Manuel Alvarado Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 9186.
The shrine, erected in the early 1980s, had fallen into disrepair.
There wasn’t a place to set flowers. The concrete was crumbling and cracked. Three stone monuments, chiseled with 500 veterans’ names, tilted and leaned from the foundations.
“It looked like something deserted out in the desert,” Riojas said. “I had tears in my eyes to see that it had deteriorated to that extent.”
When the post commander asked Riojas if he wanted to lead a project to revive the space, he agreed without hesitation. As chairman of the restoration committee, Riojas’ mission is to secure community donations and help from contractors to erect a new memorial garden.
Last week, contractors removed three granite stones, each weighing 3,000 pounds. Now they are working on removing old cement so that steel rebar can be reinstalled for new concrete outside the South Side post at 650 VFW Blvd.
“It’s all for the veterans,” Riojas said. “We can’t do enough for them.”
A drizzle fell as Riojas, a 21year Navy veteran, recently walked the muddy lawn and pointed out spots for new features with Phillip Gonzales, 71, assistant committee chair. Gonzales drew plans for a new foundation to support the reinstallation of the granite stones near Mission County Park.
Riojas said their plans call for a walkway, lined with two 7-foot benches, that leads to the monuments lit by spotlights at night.
They hope to install two new granite stones to add 200 veterans’ names who have died in the last 10 years.
The post has partnered with the Purple Heart Association on the project, estimated to cost between $35,000 and $45,000. The group’s contribution is a 7-foottall bronze statue called “The Price of Freedom.” It will feature three soldiers: one from the Vietnam War, another from the Korean War and a Black female soldier representing service in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The group is excited to help make the garden look presentable, said Tony Roman, 73, three-time commander of the local Purple Heart chapter.
“It will pay respect and honor the veterans and their families who suffered while waiting to hear from them,” he said. “This is dedicated to every veteran, but specifically the Purple Heart recipients who actually bled for our freedom.”
Roman said they plan to place a time capsule at the base of the statue to be opened in 25 years. They want veterans in San Antonio and the area to add messages and items to the canister.
Riojas, who served four tours in Vietnam, also is part of the suicide prevention committee. He said the project is part of a promise he made to comrades who died.
For more than 20 years, he had post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety attacks. His two brothers, who served in the Army, convinced him to get help with Veterans Affairs.
After six years with the VA, Riojas said he saw the light. He finally realized why he’d never died by suicide.
“It would be a disgrace and dishonor to all the men who died there for me to commit suicide because I was hurting,” he said. “If there’s an afterlife, how would I be able to face a single one of my friends?”
Riojas shares that message with other veterans in pain. His outreach is aligned with the creed engraved in the main marble monument — “We Honor the Dead by Helping the Living.”
For more information about the project and donations, call Riojas at 210-876-9635.