Wendell Tangborn on Virgil John Tangborn

“He was just a young man who desperately wanted “a clearer philosophy of life.” He endured so much just to be able to read some important books and get the knowledge that would help him understand and live a full life... Like so many boys of his generation, he never had the chance. But I think to all those boys, and their devastated families, Virgil would say, “we must face whatever life offers us and try to enrich our lives as much as possible to become an important tool in the general progress of mankind.””

“Virgil was buried in the Normandy military cemetery near Omaha beach... One of the 9386 crosses in the cemetery marks the site of Virgil’s grave... In 2000 a memorial was dedicated in Periers, at the urging of Henri Levaufre, and the support of Periers citizens. A monument was erected with four life-sized statues of American soldiers who were killed in the invasion. One of the statues is Virgil as a medic assisting a wounded comrade. The cemetery is visited by nearly 2 million people each year, most of them Europeans, who look at these crosses and say, “they did this for us”. Thus, Virgil’s memory lives on in the hearts and minds of millions of grateful people in France and other European countries.”