Wall That Heals Vietnam memorial replica makes its only 2026 Wyoming stop in Star Valley

AFTON, Wyo. — A traveling replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial will make its only 2026 Wyoming stop in Star Valley next month, the result of a year of work by a small veterans post that beat out scores of larger communities for the honor. The Wall That Heals, a three-quarter-scale version of the black granite memorial in Washington, will be open free and around the clock from July 9 to 12 on the grounds of Star Valley Middle School in Afton, organized by a local committee led by Jay Conley, Vice Commander of VFW Post 4797. Conley announced the display on The Kim Monson Show.

“We’re bringing the Vietnam Veterans three-quarter replica to western Wyoming, and it is showing up here Tuesday, and we are super excited,” Conley said on the show. He described the exhibit as the payoff of thousands of volunteer hours and said the team’s purpose was simple: give the men who served a homecoming many of them never received. “Slow roll through the Valley parade style so that everybody can welcome home these veterans,” he said of the escort that will bring the wall into town.

What the exhibit is

The Wall That Heals is a program of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, the nonprofit behind the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington. The fund unveiled the traveling replica on Veterans Day 1996, and it has since visited more than 800 communities. The exhibit is 375 feet long, the length of a football field, and stands 7.5 feet tall at its highest point, erected in the same chevron shape as the original. Its 140 panels carry the machine-engraved names of the 58,281 service members who died or remain missing from the war, lit so visitors can read them and make name rubbings day or night. A 53-foot mobile Education Center travels with the wall.

Afton is one of 31 communities the fund selected for its 2026 tour, chosen from roughly 150 applications, and the only Wyoming stop on the schedule, according to Cowboy State Daily. The previous stop is Billings, Montana.

A weeklong homecoming

The exhibit will travel through Jackson toward Alpine on Tuesday, July 7, then be escorted south through Star Valley by a motorcade, according to Buckrail. Organizers hope for hundreds of motorcycles to ride in the procession, which Conley said would roll “parade style” so residents can line the route. Volunteers will assemble the wall ahead of the opening, and Gov. Mark Gordon is scheduled to deliver the opening-ceremony speech the morning of Thursday, July 9. The exhibit then stays open 24 hours a day until 2 p.m. Sunday, July 12. A Light the Night gathering is planned at dusk on July 10; the post’s Vietnam veterans chose teal lighting, which represents post-traumatic stress, the Cowboy State Daily reported.

Bringing the names close to home

Conley said the idea grew out of a visit to the National Museum of Military Vehicles in Dubois for National Vietnam War Veterans Day, where he saw how many veterans could no longer make the trip to the capital. “It became very apparent there were a lot of veterans that are either physically or financially incapable of going to Washington, D.C.,” he said. Bringing the wall to Star Valley solved part of that problem and revealed another. “We’re bringing it close to home, and they still can’t make it,” Conley said, describing veterans for whom even the drive to Afton is out of reach. The committee has set aside fundraising to cover travel and lodging so those veterans can attend.

The post needs a minimum of 200 volunteers for the four-day display, according to SVI News. Donations can be sent to Wyoming Welcomes The Wall That Heals at PO Box 876, Afton, WY 83110, or made through the host committee’s website. More information is at the committee’s site.

Host Kim Monson, who previously interviewed Conley for her program America’s Veterans Stories, called the western Wyoming valley a place near to her heart. “God is showing off in Star Valley, Wyoming,” she said.