Editor’s note: This article by Patricia Kime originally appeared on Military.com, a leading source of news for the military and veteran community.
The Department of Veterans Affairs' website built to honor veterans who have served the country since the Revolutionary War will now allow former service members to tell their own stories before they die.
The VA announced Thursday that it has expanded its Veterans Legacy Memorial, or VLM, a website that houses the names of millions of veterans and can be used to pay tribute to former service members.
Veterans who are eligible for burial in a VA national cemetery will now be able to log into a secure site where they can upload images, autobiographies, military achievements and life milestones to their holding place.
The content will go live once the veteran passes away and the VA approves their family's request for burial or other memorial benefit.
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"Providing veterans with resources to document their stories while they are still with us ensures their voices are heard and allows family members, friends and others to appreciate the experiences of those who served," Acting Under Secretary for Memorial Affairs Ronald Walters said in a news release Thursday.
The creation of the "Your Story, Your Legacy" feature fulfills a promise made by former Under Secretary Matt Quinn, who pledged last Memorial Day to expand the site for living veterans to build their own pages by the end of 2024.
"I ask people to go and post to VLM. I think it's so important to keep that veteran's memory alive, and it's the perfect place to do it," Quinn said
The site, launched in 2019, contains the names of nearly 10 million veterans buried at national cemeteries; VA grant-funded cemeteries; cemeteries managed by the Department of Defense, including Arlington National Cemetery; U.S. Park Service cemeteries; and private cemeteries where veterans have received a VA-provided grave marker since 1996
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The VA has plans to include veterans who received grave markers before 1996, as well as those buried in overseas cemeteries managed by the American Battle Monuments Commission.
According to the VA, since 2019, more than 165,000 submissions have been made to veterans pages. The content is reviewed by National Cemetery Administration moderators before it is posted.
"Who better to talk about their time in service and their life stories than veterans themselves?" said James LaPaglia, VLM program officer, in a news release. "Their first-person narrative will have an enduring presence in VLM for family members and others to better understand the unique veteran experience."
The VLM is dependent on the reliability of participating organizations' databases, which aren't necessarily 100% accurate. LaPaglia recommended that family members who can't find their veteran click on the "customer support" link for the email and phone information of the VLM team that handles missing records.
To participate, veterans may apply online to determine pre-need eligibility. For more information about VA burial benefits, veterans can go to a national cemetery, check out the VA's burial benefits page, or call 800-827-1000.
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