A Jasper County Vietnam Veteran is the founder of the annual Vietnam Veterans Recognition Day Ceremony on the Iowa State Capitol Grounds. Tomorrow’s 18th annual ceremony begins at 11 a.m. at the Vietnam Memorial, which is south of the capitol building. Jasper County Treasurer and Veterans Advocate Doug Bishop says a Vietnam War pilot from the northwestern part of Jasper county initiated the remembrance.

“Captain Dan Gannon with the United States Marine Corps. in Vietnam,  a Jasper County resident born and raised in Mingo, was wounded in combat. He was shot while in Vietnam. He came back to the United States and got very involved in the Vietnam Veterans of America, and he started this.”

According to Bishop, six Jasper County residents lost their lives in the Vietnam War, and tomorrow will mark the 12th year that a group of veterans and supporters from Jasper County has attended the Vietnam Veterans Recognition Day ceremony. The Jasper County Veterans Affairs Commission is paying for two buses that will take 94 local Vietnam veterans and their supporters to the ceremony. The buses will leave Newton American Legion Post 111 on West 4th Street South in Newton at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday.