Vietnam Land-Clearers Association
New President’s Letter
June 6 2025
Dear Compatriots,
As your newly elected “Boss”, I wanted to thank you for the confidence you have placed in me to lead the Vietnam Land-Clearers Association for the next two years (2026d-2027) as written in our by-laws. Before I go on, one must commend the Land-Clearers Association previous “Boss”, Terry Brown, for having the sense of “Duty” to keep our organization going when no one wanted the job. He served both as the Boss and Secretary faithfully and without question. He has agreed to continue to serve on as Land-Clearers Secretary with us another term for which we are grateful. Thank you, Terry, well done.
It is truly my honor now to serve you, as it should be for all our devoted officers current, past and hopefully for the future for as long as the Association will survive, right down to the last man. It is our duty to serve the Land-Clearers to preserve our legacy in history and build upon the brotherhood we have all shared together in the cut. We do that at every reunion attended. We are all of separate and various units of the zone and time past, but we are also brothers of the same experience of war!
For this we must preserve for our children, our grand-children and the many generations of youth to follow who will one day be asked to serve our country as we were. It is our legacy and history that will continue by maintaining the Land-Clearers Association. I am proud to be a Combat Engineer, especially of the Vietnam Land-Clearers. Duty-Honor-Country, this is what we have when we attend our reunions, not knowingly maybe, but our comradery by association, is built on those hallowed three words—worth keeping alive in our continued participation of our reunions.
On another note, it is my pleasure to announce that Lady Land-Clearers is, with my instigation, now officially formed as a group within our midst. They will meet during our reunions for alternate activities from the fellows, luncheons, or business they wish to entertain. I suppose we will find out what the ladies plan to do on their own from a report after their first meeting in 2026. I fully support their desire to do more than just follow the guys around, so go make it happen ladies and good luck! There will be more information in the next newsletter. In the meantime, call me to volunteer for planning the Lady Land-Clearers doings.
I would also like to tell you that on Meet and Greet reunion day, we will only provide snacks of sorts and will ask for a minimal donation for the food, to help reduce the hunger pains for those who wish to hang around the hall through lunch. This past year donations were given for a pizza affair for lunch on day two of the reunion, just before the Dutton Show. With your generosity we collected enough to do that again next year if the membership agrees.
I am open to suggestions for our Organization, I am available for comments or info you think we should know or be aware of, or you just want to say hello and keep in touch. My contact info is listed on the web site. By the way, I am in the central time zone for calls.
I am proud of what we did as Land-Clearers in Vietnam, so thank you again for your confidence in me to lead the Land-Clearers Association for this term, 2026-27, and thank you for keeping our legacy going.
Sincerely,
Ed Atkinson, Boss