American Legion Memorial at the Logan County Safety Complex gets a facelift

[June 02, 2024]  If you’ve driven down Broadway Street recently, especially driving away from the Logan County Courthouse square, you may have noticed that the American Legion Memorial at the Logan County Safety Complex has been changed.

The new memorial is very bright and stands out much more than the previous memorial did. On a sunny and slightly windy day, the stones really shine, and the flags really come to life.

Lincoln Daily News got the chance to sit down with Gene Hickey to learn about some of the details of this project.

Hickey shared that this work was completed by the 40 and 8 with funding from the American Legion. He also shared that the Lincoln Ace Hardware donated all the landscape blocks that were used to make the border around the memorial.

When asked about the work that was done, Hickey shared that the members of the 40 and 8 started by pulling up bush stumps. The bushes that used to be there were poisoned by lime that leaked into the ground from the limestones of the old memorial. They then used acid and a pressure washer to clean the old stones.

Hickey then came up with the idea of including statues, which include a female soldier, an eagle, a marine, and a rifle, boots, and helmet. He then contacted Steve Goodman, someone who helped to tear down the old jail back in the day. Goodman had a few stones left over from the old jail and donated half of one to the project.

Hickey was then asked about why the 40 and 8 had decided to do the work that they did. He said that the work needed to be done. It did not look very good before, and they wanted to fix that. Also, the 40 and 8 hope that when this new work starts to show its age, someone else might take care of it at that time.

Hickey then provided some more information on the 40 and 8, starting with the fact that they are an honors society within the American Legion. They were initially formed during World War I in response to the high demand for nurses. The 40 and 8 started sending nurses overseas where they were most needed. Today, one of the main goals of this organization is to provide scholarships to nursing students.

If you have not yet had the chance to see the new American Legion Memorial, you should take a drive by the Safety Complex on Broadway and take a moment to appreciate all the hard work that was put into it.

[Matt Boutcher]