Vets have land, need money for memorial

Northeast Minneapolis military veterans and supporters are gaining momentum for their cause. Now they need $600,000.

By Steve Brandt, Star Tribune

Last update: November 10, 2007 - 5:37 PM

Northeasters gathered Saturday at a riverside park in Minneapolis that's yet to be built to launch a veterans memorial that's yet to be funded.

With $600,000 to raise before a reflecting pool surrounded by a memorial grove and granite markers can be built, the job might appear daunting.

But not as daunting as being ordered to retake a hill in Korea with bayonets fixed, a task Park Commissioner Walt Dziedzic recalled in his role as emcee.

Momentum also appears to be on their side. Sheridan Memorial Park will occupy the Grain Belt side of the Mississippi River in a thin band between the Broadway and 17th Street rail bridges. It's one of a string of parks that have been developed recently or are planned between Edgewater Park at Lowry Avenue and the B.F. Nelson site just upstream of the Hennepin Avenue Bridge. Bike and pedestrian paths will link them.

The roughly 75 people at the land dedication for the park could look across the river at the Park Board headquarters and see nearly completed paths stretching between the rail bridge and Plymouth Avenue.

The Park Board has raised the money for the park itself and hopes to get work underway by next spring.

The neighborhood, one of the few in Minneapolis without a park, has raised more than $40,000 for the memorial. Jenny Fortman, a Sheridan neighborhood activist, urged the crowd to donate in memory of a veteran, asking for checks to be sent to the Foundation for Minneapolis Parks with Sheridan Memorial Park in the memo line.

Fortman said the markers will be engraved with quotations from veterans. They've been gleaned from interviews or archives representing every war since Minnesota became a state.

"The intention is to give a snapshot of what it was like to be a soldier," she said.

The event also paid tribute to 88-year-old Ed Karbo, a lifelong Northeast resident and Army veteran, who has spent nine years pushing for a memorial. More than half of the group of about 15 vets who started lobbying for a memorial with him have died since.

"He's worked so hard for this," said daughter-in-law Karen Karbo.

After bugle calls, music by the Edison High School alumni marching band and a rifle salute, the crowd dispersed. But not before Dziedzic promised, "As soon as we get our money, we'll meet here again."

Steve Brandt • 612-673-4438

Steve Brandt • sbrandt@startribune.com