Traveling boots stand at attention

The exhibit of boots will be in Philadelphia on July 4.
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- People passing through the center of this city's downtown Wednesday were confronted with a grim reminder of the human cost of the war in Iraq.
In an exhibit that evoked raw emotion for many, more than 800 pairs of boots, each bearing the name, rank, age and hometown of an American killed in Iraq, were arranged around a fountain in Kennedy Square.
On the square, which is filled with battle monuments from previous wars, a U.S. flag flew at half-staff in observance of this week's death of President Reagan.
"This war is the common enemy of the American people, the Iraqi people and the peoples of the world," said the Rev. Werner Lange of Newton Falls, a volunteer with the American Friends Service Committee, which sponsors the traveling display of boots.
"Every one of these deaths was totally unnecessary. We want no further deaths, and we want to end this war now," said the Rev. Mr. Lange, pastor of St. Paul's United Church of Christ in Port Washington, Ohio.
Most passers-by seemed sympathetic to the display, titled "Eyes Wide Open -- Beyond Fear -- Towards Hope -- an Exhibit of the Iraqi War," Mr. Lange said.
Objection
But an anti-war sign accompanying the exhibit made Pete Huizar, a Marine veteran of Desert Storm, angry. "It's not honoring the military," said Huizar, 45, of New Castle, who retired last year after 24 years as a Marine.
Terrorism needs to be fought at its overseas roots, said Huizar, who said he is "100 percent" in support of the U.S. war effort in Iraq.
"If we don't keep the pressure on them, they're going to be here again," he said of terrorists, such as those who executed the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Another New Castle man, Kenneth Greenlief, who was an Army reservist during the Vietnam era, agreed that it's better for American troops to confront terrorism overseas than to let terrorism strike here again. But Greenlief said he'd like to see more nations joining the U.S. as allies in Iraq.
"The exhibit here is OK as far as I'm concerned. What I'd like to see is the government in Iraq taking over, and our men getting to come home," he said.
Destinations
The display of boots was in Youngstown on Memorial Day and in Niles on Monday. It will be in Canton today and in Philadelphia on July 4. Mr. Lange said it will tour the country until the war is over.
The New Castle boot display surrounded a permanent plaque inscribed with famous words from the inaugural address of the late President John F. Kennedy, for whom the square is named: "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."
Across from the boot display were permanent memorials to those from Lawrence County who died in the Civil and Spanish American wars and World War I, a tablet inscribed with President Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, and a Civl War cannon.