Transcripts For CSPAN2 Robert Doubek On Creating The Vietnam Veterans Memorial 20240622

That all happens starting next on seat span to book tv. Robert doubek is the cofounder of the Vietnam Veterans Foundation Fund provides an inside account of the Vietnam Veterans memorial. It was completed in 1982 after much debated competition. Good afternoon everybody. Thank you so much for coming out this afternoon. I am one of the coowners and wow, i wasnt expecting that. Thank you very you very much, that is very kind. My husband and coowner is not here, he wishes he could be but im back half of him and the rest of our staff we are delighted to have you here for this event. Its such a fascinating book and topic. Before we get started i need to make a couple of housekeeping announcements. The first of which is if you happen to have a device, of any sort that makes noise, we would be grateful if you would turn it off or silence it or get it to a point where it wont make noise. The second thing is for those of you who have been to our events, we usually ask you to pull up chairs and put them to the side, but you are very lucky and you do not need to do that because youre the second of three events we are having so we are leaving the chairs out. We will do a signing at the end and if you have a question for the questionandanswer session and could please get to one of the microphones, we videotape and you can probably tell that cspan is here and its nice that people can hear the questions you have to ask. Please make your way to a microphone if possible. The last thing last thing i would like to say, i mention this is the second of three events. We do have about 500 events here in the store. We have another 100 or so at other locations including at three of the six locations where we are now overseeing the book club. Thats brooklyn, tacoma and 14th st. Its a lot to keep track of all those events as well as our programming. If youre interested interested more in what we are offering you can find the Information Online and we just got our august calendars. They are lovely and easy to put in your purse or hang on your refrigerator. Please pick one up so you know whats going on in august. Now to the reason you are actually here which is the book and author. Its a pleasure to introduce Robert Doubek this afternoon. He will be talking about his book creating the Vietnam Veterans memorial the inside story. Now if you didnt live in washington, i assume most of you did, but if you didnt in the late 1970s or early 1980s or early 1980s or if you happen to live elsewhere or didnt read the newspaper you might not have realized there wasnt inside vietnam memorial. Since its completion completion in 1984 more than 100 Million People have visited the memorial. I suspect most of all of you are among those who have marveled at its stark simplicity. I know that i have more more than a couple of times. Perhaps there are loved ones who passed fingers over a name or leave mementos at the wall which has become part of our nations histories. It is a powerful part of the landscape of the national mall. The evolution from a vision of a set of passionate advocates and the controversy over the designers to the completion and permanent place on the mall is inside of in fact a fascinating story. Robert is going to provide the details. He was the project director while it was being erected. He served as an Intelligence Officer in the air force. Now you can add another title to his resume, author. His book it is wonderful not just for the history of the city in our nation but a wonderful chronicle of how ideals, policy and people impact the creation of a national monument. Its probably pleasure to have you all of here please welcome Robert Doubek. Well, thank you very much. Thank you very much lisa and i really think all of my friends, colleagues and compatriots who are here with me. Who i dont know personally, i am happy happy to see you here as well. In the three decades of its of existence, the veteran memorial has become a symbolic place of our history. The wall lisa has explained as its known as somewhat of the most heavily visited monuments in the country. My my book tells the story of how it was created and how it came close to not happening at all. In 1982, a day before we dedicated the memorial they vote that in keeping with the character of the vietnam war, it has been the center of an emotional debate of aesthetics and artistic renditions of war, patriotism and heroic. This is a brief recap. In 1979 a group of former Junior Officers and enlisted men came together and founded a Nonprofit Corporation to build a memorial to honor the veterans in the dead of the vietnam war. We foresee this purpose of recognizing the service and sacrifice of those who were there rather than continuing to use them as pawns in the debate against the war. The hopedfor byproduct would be that the memorial would help the country after the war since supporters and opponents could agree that the veterans deserve recognition. That led to the requirement that the memorial itself could not make any political statement about the war itself. It turned out that we were naive as others perceived a different role for the memorial. To obtain obtain a design we saw a number of alternatives. One of which was to design it ourselves which is a recipe for disaster. [laughter] a second path was to find the best five architecture in the country and hold a Competition Among them. This of course led to the question of who are you going to decide who are the best architects. We we ultimately decided on an idea to hold an open Design Competition, open to any u. S. Citizen over the age of 18 whether they are amateur or professional. Not longer than after we announce the more memorial we began to hear from a number of architects, designers, landscape architects, veterans all offering to design the memorial for free. All of them wanted to get to us before those s obs and the modernist, brutalist, elitists or abstraction got to us before them. So an open competition proved to be an Excellent Way to manage this and we also needed to be fair. For for all i knew there could be someone starving in wyoming that was born to design this. As we all know, thats almost the way it happened. We took four basic criteria for the design. First that it could make no political statement about the war. We felt it had deprived veterans of their recognition. Secondly the memorial memorial would include inscriptions of 58000 men of names of the men who dead or remain missing. This would be a special tribute. The third had to do with its location. We had we had argued very strongly to get congress to designate this place for us over the objections of the park service, to basically negotiate with the park service we had to design something we thought would be harmonious with the environment. We we can do another Lincoln Memorial or washington monument. We couldnt stick a helicopter on a pole for that matter. The fourth plan of criterion was the one that went to our philosophical base was which was that it should be contemplative in character. We werent looking for something to make a grand declaration. The most difficult decision was the composition of the jury. Again, there were advocates for ourselves being the jury and again that was a recipe for disaster. I knew very little about design and the others knew even less. The second idea was to put together a jury that could be representative all the groups representative involved in the war. There would be veterans, veterans, goldstar parents, war activists and so on. We ultimately decided to have a jury composed of the most experienced and prestigious artists and designers that we could find. This was very important because the reputation of the jurors was important to track the best designers to the competition it was also important to minimize secondguessing by the approval agencies. They had already tied up the memorial to Franklin Roosevelt for 25 years, as we know. It turns out in 1981, the jury having viewed 1421 entries in the competition, unanimously in the competition, unanimously decided on this very start simple design submitted by a 21yearold woman student. We didnt expect any opposition but if we did it wouldve come from the anti memorial and to our surprise and shock it came mainly from conservatives including powerful and influential individuals like billionaire ross perot, james webb who is now a current president ial candidate, columnist pappy cannon, monopolist tom wolfe. There were some congressmen, some senators and some members of the staff of the heritage foundation, some members of the staff of the secretary of interior. They in my opinion envisioned the memorial to reboot the Antiwar Movement and celebrate heroism and glory they saw the competition as a betrayal at first glance their negative perception may have been understandable. After all, in contrast to the gleaming white tower of the washington monument, this was black and receded into the ground. Secondly, it constituted constituted a space for contemplation rather than an object or building or any other monument to glory. In my view, the the controversy over the design that almost sank the ship constituted a perfect storm, as it was intensified by teasing and touching a number of unresolved faultlines in american society. Those are still present after the war. These included the question of whether the war itself was right or wrong, there was the question of whether it was illconceived from the outset or it was lost due to the activities of a domestic stiff column that did a back step. Also the issue is whether the veterans and dead could be honored. Regardless of whether the role war was right or wrong. Finally but among others, did, did the memorial have to be realistic and inactive stating an equivocal message or it could become template of, and provocative and allowing visitors to use their own interpretation. The other subject involved race. Was was it appropriate for a person of asian descent to design a memorial to men and women who fought against asians . As the debate dragged on, these faultlines revealed themselves in statements, in rumors, we heard the memorial had been quote designed by a good, that that one of the juries was a communist, that the majority of the jurors had been antiwar activists and also that the memorials extension of any statement about the war itself amounted to an antiwar statement. The controversy reached such a point that the secretary was prepared to shoot it down. He was deflated by the prospect of a compromise and how we achieved that, of course, is is laid out in my book. [laughter] among other things the book deals with our the challenge of conducting a largest Design Competition ever held in the United States and the meticulous task of verifying the accuracy and complete list and complete this completeness of every name that was going to be inscribed in stone. Judith martin, chuck hagel, ross perot, lisbeth taylor, john warner and webb. Id. Id like to read a few passages. Okay, this starts off in april 1979 and i attended and i attended a meeting called for the purpose of generating publicity for vietnam veteran needs. Suddenly the lone wolf who had not said a word stood up and throughout his idea. What about a memorial question . In view of the discussion, he came totally out of left field. What you mean someone said. I mean having a National Memorial for Vietnam Veterans. Vietnam veterans dont need a memorial, they need Better Benefits shot back feldman. A few others made similar remarks and some smirked while the man stood silently. No one spoke in support and i felt sorry for him. The idea felt out of place. After he set down a looking at him and thinking about his idea. While some veterans while some veterans truly needed more benefits, most didnt. All did need some recognition and acknowledgment of their service in the war. I had to face combat and hadnt been injured, but many had. I met some of the best people in my life in the military and in vietnam. Many believe in pres. Kennedys words words to defend your country. I heard all of this idealism, heroism with lightly veiled contempt by the yuppie veiled people of washington. There are some good lawyers too. [laughter] the next passage deals with in december 1979 senator john warner, really not far away from here, held a a breakfast at his house in georgetown to raise the initial money we needed to launch the fundraising campaign. As a ring the doorbell, i will laugh to myself about what was on my mind. Soon we would learn the answer to the question in chief. Would we get to meet Elizabeth Taylor . I was fairly certain we wouldnt as i assume she stayed at warners estate in virginia. I couldnt imagine someone so famous could have any privacy living in washington. Political politicians were dime a dozen but hollywood stars stopped and turned had. The room soon filled up with men and conservative suits. Monica. Monica healy was the only woman. It was an equal standoff of two generations of veterans. Thirteen of us had served in or during vietnam. Thirteen corporate reps were old enough to be our fathers. Many many were retired military officers who had served in world war ii, korea and vietnam. I started in the breakfast line to get it out of the way. The conversation had quieted as men throughout the room focused on eating while balancing plates and coffee cups on their knees. Suddenly to my left, the kitchen door flew open and warner step through decisively. Gentlemen, the chef. He announce. Behind him through the door followed taylor. She wrote wore a pink robe and it was tied around her neck with fluffy white balls at each end. On her feet she wore pink slippers with fluffy white balls matching those on her collar. The same sound i had always heard when someone entered a room. The entire entire room now stood at attention. Those of us formed a fairly straight rank and i could see a man holding out his plate at belt level as if holding out his scrambled eggs. [laughter] taylor was greeting each individual personally pitching now became nervous and soon it would be my turn. Suddenly suddenly i was gazing into her purple tinged blue eyes surrounded by a wreath of raven hair. She had gained some weight but her face could still launch a thousand ships. I introduced myself and felt her firm handshake. She smiled and for an instant i thought i passed the test. Then suddenly she said whats that and pointed to my lapel. I wore a white metal disk and George Washington was printed in purple to symbolize the purple metal. The red cross had given out this type of button when i was a kid. I didnt like them but for the time being they were all we had. Oh yes, these are vietnam veteran lapel pins. May i have one . Of course i said bending my head down and tucking my head down to undo the plan. Finally i held it out and face my dilemma. The the only place it could possibly attached to her attire was the fluffy ball dangling very close to her breast. To clamp the disc around the cord would take a lot of death stared he which wasnt my strong suit. I could easily slip. Do i dare to actually put my hands near inches from those magnificent orbs question i didnt. I held the pin out until she finally realize my dilemma and took it and pinned it herself on the cord. As she moved on i thought to on i thought to myself, no guts no glory. The last occurred in may, actually that was a total of 18 months later, later, we had gone through the Design Competition and announce the winning design with a press conference at the aia on may 6, 1981. This talks about the reaction to the design. This this is before social media and email. The mail in subsequent weeks came from those critical of the result. In architecting california said the design has the warmth and charm of in a city and dagger and fits the meadow setting like a knife point scar. The American Public has been led by nihilistic states. The vietnam veteran called it the hole in the earth which suggests to be digging in and hiding. It it suggests me the public perception, the pit. The proposed memorial reflects the true situation of the vietnam veteran, bury the dead and ignore the needs of the living. His own design was a statue of a soldier sitting slumped over with his rifle across his knees. An architect from washington d. C. Saw the selection as an extreme disservice to the public, the veterans and other competitors as well. With the thought that the monument was there memorial and shouldve been there selection. Even his motherinlaw chimed in, your choices a joke and you should be a shot ashamed of yourself. They said it was neither inspirational nor thoughtprovoking, just a black wall wall that expresses nothing. He suggested using it as a backdrop as a huge piece of broken bamboo with barbed wire twining around it. Another veteran said it is much easier to spit into a hole than to spit on a statue. One could almost him imagine them sitting on the Selection Committee and looking for the design that best made a mockery of the 58,000 dead. There are other quotes but youll have to read those for yourself. Before i conclude, in writing the book in knowing the reaction to the memorial and the thought behind it, i think our opponents may be correct in that the memorial as designed really primarily honors the dead rather than all of the veterans, and this is especially because the design is very strongly overpowered by the instrument inscription of the names which are the most powerful elements. At the same time i would say its really what the country needed. They needed to mourn. This memorial evoked that. I would also think that the memorial would have had the same positive effect on the veterans that it has had had we styled it at the beginning as simply a memorial to those who died in the war. I know some may disagree. Before we go to questions, i just want to point out there are a number of people here who are mentioned in the book. In in the front row is patrick who worked, who is primarily our account representative for our Public Relations campaign. To my left is john woods, he is a disabled combat veteran of war. He served with metxwc÷ on the ee conceptualization of the Design Competition and he sat on the panel that accepted the juries decision. Is there anyone else here thats come in late that i have missed . Jim . This is jim, he is a marine officer, combat veteran in vietnam and hes the guy who got up before the Fine Arts Commission in support of the design and said ill match anybody metal for metal. She won that competition fair and square. Bill leckie, i didnt think think you were going to make it. This is bill of of the partnership who we selected to be the architect of record. This is the man that has partnered cant cooper who shepherd this whole design from a concept into a set of plans and actually got the team going. He is also the designer of the korean war memorial. Can i say that . Is that correct bill . The architect for it [applause]. So if you have a question and can make your way to the microphone, we would be grateful for that. Id like to make a comment rather than a question, when we talk about the impact this had on veterans, when i went out to the memorial three or four days before it was set to open to set up stands into all of the usual things, the memorial was supposedly blocked off and yet there were people had gone through the blocks, they just threw them aside and they were out there just bringing mementos already to the memorial before it even opened. I thought thought at that point, i think this is going to be just fine and the opponents of it are just going to have to give up. It was a trivet day. Thank you. Thank you for the book, i very much enjoyed reading the rest of the story. A good. I have two short questions. In several instances you mentioned that you were ambivalent toward the design. You are not an artist, you are a lawyer. Where do you stand on that today . Then, i would just like to quote here, this is mild in, she was reportedly sick at heart wanting to see the memorial built as designed or not all. He felt we needed to show sufficient respect for the Design Community and let her testify against it at finance. Has she she reconciled herself to the memorial as built . The first one was yes, i have to say as i say in the book, during the entire time it was under construction i would go to work one day and be positive behind it and the second day id think we were making a mistake. I was not a designer, my background was a lawyer and i relied upon experts. We had the best during the country, but many of the opponents were people i respected for their courage, sacrifice and heroism. I would say nowadays, i really think think we did the right thing. It may be because ive gotten so many overwhelming positive comments from complete strangers about it. Your your second question had to do with had she reconciled with the way it was built. You know, i am really not sure. I havent seen any comment from her that pins that down. I, thank you very much for the book and all the hard work you did on the memorial. Thank you for inviting me to some of those very early meetings. Anyway, ive ive met you of course that Georgetown Law School and im curious in terms of the players now, like jack wheeler and what are they doing now and you all get together for anniversary meetings of the group or any upcoming thing or whats the dash. As you well know with your activities in support of the hungarians, all of my nonprofit activities have been in support of the Czech Republic in the last two decades. Basically, tragically, john wheeler was murdered right after the new year in 2001 or 2000. The crime has not been solved. James scruggs continued on as the president for the foundation of the Czech Republic. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund and really just stepped down as the chief operating officer in earlier this year. There is something in the paper about that. A you thought it would originally go out of existence. Thats right they came back and did a lot of other activity and they got underway the idea to build this Education Center on the wall. Thank you again. Before i take another question, i just want to say i just recognize harry robinson. Harry is also in the book. He was the dean of architecture at howard university. I remember when he called me up and said, bob, im the only dean of a major Architectural School and this country that was in vietnam. He testified before the Fine Arts Commission and held a lot of credibility. Thank you. As we talked earlier i was a reporter at the Washington Times when this was first getting off the ground. The challenges you had in getting this done as you cited ross perot and jim webb and i wrote some of the stories quoting them so i know of the things you did and with particular criticism that a lot of veterans had. Im a veteran myself. They felt there was too much focus on the people that were killed and they certainly deserve a lot of attention. I was wondering now if you have questions like perot and web and web is still back in the limelight again. Have you heard anything about it from him or from veterans in general . As i would agree, it kind of created oris established a foundation to allow the nation to heal so there was a broader dynamic and kudos to you for that. No i havent heard anything and im hoping not to hear from mr. Perot. I wont mention donald trump. [laughter] ive heard nothing and i heard a statement from jim webb years ago and he said he didnt have any problem with it as it was now laid out. As far as my impression, it has been totally embraced by the Vietnam Veterans community. Judging by the the fact that we have 50000 motorcycles come for Rolling Thunder every memorial day and there continues to be tremendous Public Acceptance of the memorial, i think it has served its purpose very well. I would would echo that. Thank you. Hello bob. Do you feel the memorial really achieved its objectives . Do we have further to go in terms of healing those wounds from the vietnam war in our Society Today . Well, you know, now you are getting into, as we say, subjects above my pay grade, but ill take a stab at it. I think weve done enough. The memorial has done as much as any memorial could do to heal the wounds of the vietnam war. I think one of the Major Healing elements is that the public embrace, has embraced the veterans for their service. I dont think there is anybody who is trying to blame the veterans for the war anymore. On the other hand, i would say say theres always going to be risks in our society. We have red states and blue states based on my reading of American History these riffs go back to centuries or more. Two points, one i wanted to mention at the top, not only is scruggs name inscribed but also jack wheeler and those people arent even aware that its there. What you are talking about, what the gentleman is referring to, is that because obviously you build a 10foot drop off, at the beginning everybody thought will how are you going to keep people from falling over . The design solution was to put a curb about 2 feet high. On that curb where it needs, several years after the dedication, the Memorial Fund put a cornerstone and unfortunately people dont get up there to see it because that area is pretty much blocked off. My name happens to be on it to. All look for next time i sneak up the. The other point, the Education Center . Where do you come down on the Education Center . Pro or against. Some people argue its taking up valuable space on the mall. Frankly, i prefer not to i dont have an opinion. My name is rick and i wanted to thank all of you who participated. I get choked up every time i go through there. I wasnt a bet but i lost a good friend. Contemplating and reflective is about my pay grade as a former teacher, i have, i have two simple true false questions. One, did myelins professor answer the competition. False. Contrary from what we can all hear from the tour guides and other experts. Two did the designer professor indeed give her a c on the project. False. Thank you. If you turn to the postscript in my book, if if i have time for this, there was a in 2002 there was an article published about the designer. There was a fullpage picture of her. They said we had betrayed her by adding the statue. My letter to the editor published in response to the article pointed out the efforts made to defend her design and build it intact. A few weeks later my letter appeared and i received an empathetic letter from the professor. He also had to deal with the misconceptions over the year. Regarding the d p plus grade it was actually an a. She had been in in different student. The assignment for the memorial was the last project. Her first idea, in a, in a preliminary view was a piece of baroque sculpture. He suggested another direction. They had enlisted to architects to join him for the final class presentation for which the designer submitted a scheme of a line of falling dominoes with the wall as a backdrop. One of the backdrop suggested she drop the dominoes and leave the wall for a nice piece of minimalist art. Then one of the jurors or a student suggested that names should start and finish with the apex of the angle completing the idea of a great buried box. Thanks for the question. Next question. I actually have two questions. The first question is, with all the negativity surrounding the war, from the total cost to our nation and funding, what is your opinion as to why the wall is so popular . Well bob, i think think its a combination of the fact that the war was the experience of our generation and it touched so many people. I think the wall is popular for two reasons, because it speaks to that memory that is in the consciousness of the nation, but i believe believe it also speaks because of its unique and pitiful design, which again is sort of lies above my pay grade. The second question is, knowing all the obstacles that you went through, and some of them seemed very unsurmountable, i imagine at one time or another , what was the turning point where you felt this was actually going to happen . Well it happened on monday. [laughter] it happened on monday march 15, 1982. I called up Janet Parsons at the National Capital region and i said janet whats the status of the permit . He said its ready and i said okay. I got in the cab and went down to the mall and its a big stack of requirements and he said dont you have to get your boards approval, the board consent before you sign that . I said i have all the authority i need and i walked away with it. I called scruggs and i said i got the permit. I got the damn permit. We called up bill bain and that was a monday. We had the mall torn up by the end of the week. Theres a picture in the book and we did not want to go through another weekend with the threat of an injunction by ross perot or. Could you make a comment on to individuals i know you mentioned john parsons and could you tell how critical he was . And two, could you also talk little bit about Michael Davis . In this project there are, i think, i go through my index which my publisher made me create myself and i have almost 1000 headings. Probably two thirds of them are names of people so there were a lot of individuals involved and played various roles that was Davis Buckley who we interviewed to be the professional advisor in the Design Competition and i would also like to point out where we have the designer of the korean war memorial, he is the designer of the Law Enforcement memorial. John parsons was the head of landuse planning for the National Capital region, and as as i write in the book, he was the guy who stuck his neck out to help us get this thing built and he was sort of on the cusp between the political coming from the secretary watts office and if there is anybody who would have been hung out to dry have this thing gone south it would have been john parsons, but he stuck with it the whole time. I correspond with john. He is retired in South Carolina at this point. General Michael S Davidson was, as i write my book, central casting could not have created a better image of a general than Michael S Davidson in the flesh. He, at the age of 27 had commanded had commanded an infantry regiment in italy during world war ii. He was a fourstar general command of the army in europe, he also was the commander of the invasion of cambodia. By the time we met him he was out of the service and working for an engineering firm. He was also the president of the uso. He embraced our cause. For someone, as i say an officer, professional warrior, to warrior, to do so much to save a very quiet contemplated piece of art and theres many stories i could tell about him, but two things, he took on the questionable role of being at interface with mr. Perrault and secondly he is the one who actually stood up at this heated meeting in january of 1982 and said why dont we keep the wall intact and add a statue. That was basically what started the process of achieving the compromise and scaling down the statue to a realistic size and locating it so its compatible with the wall. I think we have time for one or two more questions. At least 11. So i will be one a. I had the privilege of working with bob in a financial institution. His his knowledge of jurisprudence actually solved problems. Maybe in some cases it doesnt, but i know bob knows how to attack problems. Secondly i want to commend you on how well and how precisely you described Elizabeth Taylors confrontation. [laughter] ive never known you to do it so nicely, bob. [laughter] third, the combat in be it vietnam was so disheartening for everyone, but for for you to bring to the public your combat to get this memorial approved, i salute you. Think you fill i must point out that i have at home, framed and hanging in the powder room, a cartoon that appeared in the Chicago Tribune that was a proposed memorial in response to the oppose wall. We worked together back at first american. You covered a marvelous, you are a marvelous storyteller. I couldnt put the book down even though ive had a few things to say about it over the last two years. You mentioned and bring to light a lot of personal issues of your own, career path, being a lawyer and your dissatisfaction with things and i think the folks here would probably be interested to know, one of the things you also took away besides the satisfaction of building this phenomenal memorial and that is that you have become a builder of memorials. Perhaps the folks here would like to know about your other triumphs in that respect which are maybe not as controversial, but very, very significant and people should look for them when they are in the places that they exist. Perhaps you could enlighten them. Thank you, bruce. I think. I think what bruce is referring to is mike grandparents were czech immigrants. From the revolution in 1989, i was overjoyed and astounded and i wanted to see what i could do to see how we americans of check extraction could change the vermont democracy. I founded an organization and 95 called the american friends of the Czech Republic and wanted to be the advocate to get the checks in the nato. The foundation continued and we built a memorial at 23rd and mass avenue to honor the liberator of czechoslovakia in 1918. That has become a mecca for every delegation coming from prague, any official delegation goes there and places read. There was a parliamentary parliamentary delegation and they were so proud and so grateful and they said there has to be a second act. I recall recall from memory that there once was a monument to Woodrow Wilson in product. I researched it and it had built in 1928 with funds contributed by americans of czech dissent. It had been torn down by the nazis three days after pearl harbor. And i said well are we going to let the nazis have the last word . I propose to the board and we embrace the project and we rededicated the Woodrow Wilson monument in prague in october 2011. When you go to prague, make sure prod, make sure to go to wilson station and see the monument to wilson. Thank you. Yes, i might also also mention that we also established a small monument to president harville in alumni square at Georgetown University which is a very quiet little garden we have created with a chair in a table with a linden tree growing out of it which is the national tree. Thank you all. Thank you