A military veteran’s memorial will be on display at Wild Rose Casino and Resort in Jefferson next week. 

Wild Rose Jefferson General Manager Travis Dvorak says the “Remember Our Fallen” exhibit includes 35 banners with pictures and names of veterans who served and died in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The memorial will be on display from July 2nd-8th in the atiram of the casino and the Greene Room events center. Dvorak explains that they wanted to bring this memorial to the casino, following the success of the 9/11 memorial in 2017. 

“We wanted to redo that, but we wanted to do it inside. Because as great as that display (9/11 memorial) was it was outside. We didn’t expect to see the type of response we got. We found that people were outside for hours at a time, standing there and waiting in line, on a hot July summer day, in the concrete. But this year we wanted to do something indoors so that you can kind of come and go as you want.”  

Being a Marine veteran himself and coming from a military family, Dvorak says memorials like this have a special impact.

“I’m sure this will be another moment for me to be really proud and maybe taken aback. Part of me kind of wonders when I go through there, I don’t want to see this but I know I’m going to find a friend that I was in the Marines with and I know he’s going to be up there somewhere. I hope to not see it but I’m afraid I’m going to recognize a name or two.”

Dvorak encourages visitors to practice social distancing and wear a face mask while viewing the display, there will also be hand sanitizer dispensers throughout the exhibit. The exhibit is free and open to the public.