March 19, 2024

Veterans’ memorial project

There has been some recent changes to the courthouse lawn. The veterans’ memorial project in the courthouse lawn has finally come to a reality.

What started a couple of years ago as a simple project of adding some memorial benches soon grew into not only adding memorial benches, but also a bronze statue on a custom base with bronze emblems representing each of the branches of service, and nearly 3,000 engraved bricks representing the veterans from and buried in Clarke County cemeteries.

This spring and summer rains hampered construction, but thanks to Jim Shelton of Country Concrete who donated his time, we were able to finally get concrete poured and bricks in place.

Special thanks to all who purchased bricks and benches, gave generous donations and grants. The final cost for the completed project was $61,500. Thank you to Clarke County Development Corporation for their matching grant of $26,000. This grant enabled us to purchase bricks for those fallen veterans from as far back as the War of 1812.

Special thanks to Doug Black who has done extensive research cataloging the veterans who are buried in various Clarke County cemeteries and provided those lists to us. Also special thanks to Valerie Funk who made and raffled a beautiful quilt honoring our veterans and donated all proceeds to the project.

There are many more who helped in various ways and we appreciate all your help.

There is still time to order a memorial brick as there were plenty of spacers bricks put in place for additional engraved bricks. The next order will be going in Oct. 30. If you would like to order a brick, please contact Tammy Thomas at 641-342-2712.