True test of new National Veterans Memorial will be inside

Anytime you put “National” in front of a name, you’re claiming a pretty high threshold of authority. So it is with the new National Veterans Memorial and Museum that officially came into being last week with a few strokes of President Donald Trump’s pen, even though the facility remains under construction on the Scioto Peninsula and won’t open until fall.

The designation ramps up the pressure on the replacement of the old Franklin County Veterans Memorial to be much more than its predecessor ever aspired to be, and that’s a good thing.

Credit for expanding the vision for what this memorial and museum could be must be shared. Ohio’s much-loved national hero, the late former astronaut and U.S. Sen. John Glenn, had the vision to suggest a national focus for what initially was proposed as the Ohio Veterans Memorial.

The Marine Corps colonel’s idea was spurred to reality by a $25 million donation from Abigail and Les Wexner — a couple known to think big and back up dreams with personal resources. Central Ohio has been a fortunate beneficiary of the Wexners’ leadership and generosity before, with expansions and lofty ambitions at the OSU Wexner Medical Center and Nationwide Children’s Hospital among the visible evidence of their influence.

Actually securing the designation for Columbus to host a national museum for veterans was realized through bipartisan efforts of Reps. Joyce Beatty, D-Columbus, and Steve Stivers, R-Upper Arlington, with support from Sens. Rob Portman, R-OH, and Sherrod Brown, D-OH.

And now to make the vast vision real, retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Ferriter has been drafted as the inaugural president and CEO for the center that hopes to attract hundreds of thousands of visitors. This mission won’t be as dangerous as his combat sorties as an Army Airborne Ranger and Special Forces officer, but it is no less important.

The legacy and honor of the men and women from all branches of the U.S. Armed Forces, currently represented by 21 million living veterans, are entrusted to Ferriter and whomever he brings in as museum director and a supporting crew.

Guy Worley and the Columbus Downtown Development Corporation he heads have done a fine job managing construction of the $75 million, 53,000-square-foot memorial and museum.

The building itself has received some early accolades — being named one of five U.S. buildings on Architectural Digest’s dozen most-anticipated buildings worldwide for 2018. The magazine called the facility’s spiral design “beautifully understated” and “appropriately somber.”

That’s another way of saying it won’t be what’s on the outside but what will be offered on the inside that could potentially put and keep the National Veterans Memorial and Museum on family-vacation and military-reunion travel itineraries across the country.

The challenge may have been said best in “Saving Private Ryan,” the now-classic 1998 Steven Spielberg film, when Tom Hanks as a dying Capt. John Miller whispered earnestly to the title character played by Matt Damon: “Earn this. Earn it.”

Worley has rightly said the museum will not be a place to see tanks and planes — and luckily we’ve got Motts Military Museum in Groveport for that.

Instead, he promises this will be “where you’ll learn about our veterans and why they served.”

Those stories, if well told, should be a sufficient and much-needed draw.