The Michigan War Dog Memorial
Presentation Type
Poster
Release Option
Metadata Only
Description
The Michigan War Dog Memorial is a non-profit organization located in South Lyon, Michigan. The memorial was established in 2012 and still has service dogs being actively buried there. The site originally “started as a family pet cemetery in the 1930s” and then was restored by Phil Weitlauf into the memorial. Weitlauf was a Vietnam War veteran and decided he was the right person to help restore the cemetery. The mission of the memorial is to “provide research for military records and/or service records” to honor K-9s for their service at no cost to the owner. The memorial allows people to understand the service these dogs did and provide them the respect they deserve. During the Vietnam War “4,234 ‘War Dogs’ were deployed… and it is estimated [that] they saved over 10,000 [human] lives.” The dogs were used to detect explosives and boobytraps left by North Vietamese. After America announced they were pulling out troops from Vietnam, an order came down from Washington DC to leave the dogs. The memorial is used to commemorate the left behind heroes of the Vietnam War.
Faculty Mentor
Bill Allison
Department of Primary Presenter's Major
Department of History
Symposium Year
2024
The Michigan War Dog Memorial
