South Sioux City and Washington, D.C., are more than 1,000 miles apart, and even farther apart in population and culture, but there’s something they share: three memorials to war dead. They are sisters in remembrance.

At the Siouxland Freedom Park in South Sioux City is a half-scale replica of the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, with all 58,272 names inscribed – 99 of them from the Siouxland area, just like the one in the nation’s capital. Among those names is a Lincoln native, one of nearly 400 Nebraskans who died in the southeast Asian conflict.

With bullets whizzing past, Lincoln-born Army Specialist Four Jerry Cozad stood behind the big gun in the jungles of Cambodia, firing off rounds toward the enemy, unsure if they were hitting their targets. Then, a month shy of his 21st birthday, he was hit by a bullet. Cozad died from his wounds on May 16, 1970. His name is found in section 10w, line 47 of both walls in South Sioux City and Washington.

Growing up in Lincoln, Lynn Fuller never knew her Uncle Jerry. Still, she wondered how her family’s life would have changed had he survived. The Lincoln Northeast High School graduate wrote a letter on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund website.

“On days like today (Memorial Day 2017), all the ‘what ifs’ flood my mind,” Fuller wrote. Knowing Jerry Cozad’s name on the wall provides comfort, appreciating that her uncle has been recognized for his service to the country. South Sioux City’s wall was dedicated in 2014.

Her father, Keith, a Marine veteran, raises the flag every military-related holiday, missing his brother: Jerry and Gary, who was paralyzed after his vehicle hit a landmine in Vietnam and later died after returning home. Her family continues to honor her relatives on holidays.

Driving by Freedom Park, located about a stone’s throw from the Missouri River, it’s common to see a solitary figure at night, leaning against the memorial or pressing a hand next to a name. For some, it’s a private moment remembering one of the most difficult – if not the toughest – times of their lives. Fighting a determined enemy in jungles 8,000 miles from home, and knowing the war was unpopular, they endured. Coming back, it has taken decades for their service to be recognized and honored.

Attending a traveling exhibit of the wall about 20 years ago in Sioux City, Iowa, Mike Newhouse, president of the park foundation, and a few other people realized the Siouxland area needed an exhibit that wouldn’t travel. They set about to make a permanent installation happen, raising millions from large donations to schoolchildren’s spare quarters.

Vietnam War dead aren’t the only ones remembered at Freedom Park. The “Forgotten War” – Korea – is remembered, too, with two-dimensional replicas of the 3D soldiers depicted in Washington, trudging through the muck and mire of a two-year-long war that ended in stalemate. Night visitors to Freedom Park’s Korea exhibit, dedicated in 2023, can find those soldiers walking through an illuminated rice field, offering a ghostly and breathtaking experience.

Beyond the memorials, visitors get an up-close look at war and its impact, as area veterans share personal stories through a series of videos at the Brigadier General Bud and Doris Day Interpretive Center. Military uniforms, Army boots, a cavalry hat and helmets highlight personal memorabilia at the center. A mural showcasing a timeline of American wars is also located at the center.

John Rice, an enrolled citizen of the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska, died during the Korean War. Denied a burial spot at Sioux City cemeteries because he was Indigenous, President Harry S. Truman ordered Rice buried with honors at Arlington Cemetery in Washington. Rice appears along with several area military personnel on the Freedom Rock near the Freedom Park interpretive center. The Freedom Rock is the first to appear outside of Iowa, created by Iowan Bubba Sorensen, who painted Freedom Rocks for his state’s 99 counties.

Once a 55-acre dumping ground, the Freedom Park includes the Memorial Dog Park named in honor of fallen Navy SEAL Team Six member John Douangdara. He and his War Dog, Bart, and 29 fellow service members died in 2011 when their CH-47 Chinook helicopter crashed after a rocket-launched grenade disabled it on Aug. 6, 2011, in the Wardak Province of Afghanistan, the costliest day in SEAL Team Six history.

The son of Laotian immigrants and a 2003 graduate of South Sioux City High School, Douangdara handled Bart, a Belgian Malinois, for SEAL Team Six. He is buried at Arlington National Cemetery, “so he’s not close to home,” said his sister, Ghan Follen, at Freedom Park’s groundbreaking in 2012. “We wanted something that would be of him, close to home.”

Freedom Park welcomes leashed dogs and their owners. Dog owners approve. The park receives five-bone reviews on the BringFido website. The dog park includes a replica of a statue of Douangdara and Bart at the U.S. Navy Memorial Visitors’ Center in Washington, 1,200 miles away. Follen was on hand for the 2021 dedication of her brother’s Washington statue, titled “Service and Sacrifice,” commissioned by the U.S. War Dogs Association.

Most Navy SEAL dogs are Malinois. That includes Cairo, who helped SEAL Team Six kill Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden at his compound in Pakistan on May 2, 2011, three months before the helicopter carrying Douangdara and Bart went down.