National Garden of American Heroes

On July 3rd, President Donald Trump issued “Executive Order on Building and Rebuilding Monuments to American Heroes“.  It includes an initiative to create the National Garden of American Heroes.  The Garden will commemorate exceptional individuals representing various dimensions of American life and history.  A special Task Force has been created to plan and carry out this mission, chaired by the Secretary of the Interior, Mr. David L. Bernhardt.  Mr. Charles Laudner has been appointed the Executive Director of the Task Force.  Candidates to be honored in the Garden, which could be called the American Pantheon, are to be selected primarily on the basis of votes from the public.

For us, Polish Americans, this is a unique opportunity, but also a duty, to bring to the public attention, and have commemorated for the future generations, the works and achievements of our greatest compatriots of Polish origin who contributed most to America.

Now it is up to us to scan our memory and come up with candidates for inclusion.  It should be strongly emphasized that the figures in the Garden will remain commemorated for – perhaps – centuries. Therefore, it is difficult to overestimate the importance of having as many people of Polish origin as possible there. It is all up to us now.

We have quite a few heroes of wars, people of arts and culture, scientists, engineers, inventors and others with Polish background to propose (as long as they can be clearly lined to America, naturally).  It is important to write a short supporting statement explaining their achievements and their value to the United States.

For example, Tadeusz Kościuszko and Kazimierz Pulaski are already widely recognized as American heroes, so we probably should look further and deeper: Gen. Ryszard Kukliński, Col. Francis Stanley “Gabby” Gabreski (two-war ace pilot, one of the 30 most decorated members of the US Armed Forces), and likewise Col. Matt Urban.   We should also submit candidacies of Gen. Wlodzimierz Krzyzanowski, Alexander A. Drabik, Ignacy J. Paderewski, Korczak Ziolkowski (sculptor), Helena Modrzejewska (Modjeska), just to name a few.  It should not do any harm if a candidate’s name is proposed multiple times by several organizations or individuals – to the contrary, it might even help.  Just as helpful may be adding links to good publications on the Web, such as this one on the multi-lingual site Culture.pl.

Also worth considering: why don’t we try to work with local authorities in counties and municipalities named “Pulaski” and “Kosciuszko”, across the country?  How about other organizations bearing names of Polish American heroes?

The point is that we need to do it NOW: to the best of our knowledge, the deadline for submitting candidates is September 1^st, 2020.

Coalition of Polish Americans is convinced that one of the defining elements of American history has been opposition to totalitarian regimes and the pursuit of freedom for all, and therefore heroes of the struggle against Soviet Communism deserve a prominent place in this American Pantheon. We decided to suggest and support Gen. Ryszard Kukliński. The letter of recommendation which we sent to Director Laudner can be found here.

For your reference, here is the Web site where you can get more details on the matter: https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/trump-administration-task-force-building-and-rebuilding-monuments-american-heroes.  While charles_laudner@nps.gov is probably the best address for submissions of candidates, the site above adds another: americanheroesinfo@ios.doi.gov.