NCA unveils “Find A Veteran, Post A Tribute” campaign

VA’s National Cemetery Administration (NCA) launched its new “Find A Veteran, Post A Tribute” campaign. The effort intends to increase awareness of the Veterans Legacy Memorial (VLM) – the nation’s first digital platform dedicated entirely to memorializing more than 3.7 million Veterans interred in VA’s national cemeteries.

Launched in 2019 with Veteran service and cemetery information, VLM now allows family, friends and others to post tributes to a Veteran’s page and to share Veteran pages using email, Facebook and Twitter.

“VLM is the future of memorialization,” said Under Secretary for Memorial Affairs Randy Reeves. “With this awareness campaign, we encourage visitors to find a Veteran on the website and post a tribute on the Veteran’s page during the month of November. This is a great way for members of the public to help make sure that No Veteran Ever Dies.”

The site, which can be accessed at www.va.gov/remember, allows visitors to “find a Veteran” using a search box by entering the Veteran’s first and last name, or an advanced search option using middle name and service branch. Each page publicly displays available information gathered from VA records, including service branch with logo, dates of birth and death, rank, war period, highest decoration, emblem of belief, and grave location. The image above shows the service page for WWII Veteran and Medal of Honor recipient Daniel K. Inouye.

How to Post a Tribute

Visitors can “post a Tribute” (text comment) on a page as a guest user or by registering and logging into VLM using an ID.me account. Tributes can be made in three ways: as a direct entry on a Veteran’s page; as a reply to someone else’s tribute on a Veteran’s page; or as a direct entry to a memento (photo) on a Veteran’s page. Once a Tribute is reviewed by VLM moderators to determine if it complies with the VLM User Policy, it will be posted to the Veteran’s page – typically within two business days. Visitors can also share their Veteran’s VLM page, including Tributes to email and social media sites, Facebook and Twitter, by clicking one of the share buttons in the upper right of the Veteran’s page.

NCA Campaign Partners

The “Find A Veteran, Post A Tribute” campaign will include daily social media posts taken from existing VLM Tributes. Joining NCA in sharing these Tributes will be Carry The Load, a nonprofit organization dedicated to remembering Veterans’ service and sacrifice, Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS), a nonprofit Veterans Service Organization that provides comfort, care and resources to all those grieving the death of a military loved one; Boy Scouts of America (BSA), VA’s Center for Women Veterans (CWV), VA’s Center for Minority Veterans (CMV), VA’s Office of Information and Technology; VA’s VLM partners GovCIO and Keeper; and the Women in Military Service for America Memorial (WIMSA).