To Heal a Nation is a 1988 drama television film that tells the true story of Jan Scruggs (played by Eric Roberts), a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War. The film was directed by William A. Graham.
The film was made available on video on January 6, 1993.
In 1979, Scruggs is working for the US Department of Labor. He becomes obsessed with the dream of erecting a monument to the people who died in Vietnam.
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The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a U.S. national memorial in Washington, D.C., honoring service members of the U.S. armed forces who served in the Vietnam War. The two-acre (8,100 m2) site is dominated by two black granite walls engraved with the names of those service members who died or remain missing as a result of their service in Vietnam and South East Asia during the war. The Wall, completed in 1982, has since been supplemented with the statue The Three Soldiers in 1984 and the Vietnam Women's Memorial in 1993.
Earl Eugene Scruggs was an American musician noted for popularizing a three-finger banjo picking style, now called "Scruggs style", which is a defining characteristic of bluegrass music. His three-finger style of playing was radically different from the traditional way the five-string banjo had previously been played. This new style of playing became popular and elevated the banjo from its previous role as a background rhythm instrument to featured solo status. He popularized the instrument across several genres of music.
Timothy Blake Nelson is an American actor and playwright.
Robert Wuhl is an American actor, comedian and writer. He is best known as the creator and star of the television comedy series Arliss (1996–2002) and for his portrayal of newspaper reporter Alexander Knox in Tim Burton's Batman (1989) and Larry in Bull Durham (1988).
Enrico Antonio Giorgio Spinetti is a Welsh session drummer whose playing has featured on many prominent rock and pop albums.
Tour of Duty is an American military drama television series based on events in the Vietnam War, broadcast on CBS. The series ran for three seasons, from September 24, 1987, to April 28, 1990, for a total of 58 one-hour episodes. The show was created by Steve Duncan and L. Travis Clark and produced by Zev Braun.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the Vietnam War:
Lionel Chetwynd is a screenwriter, director and producer from England.
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, Inc. (VVMF), is the non-profit organization established on April 27, 1979, by Jan Scruggs, a former Army Infantry in Vietnam. Others veterans joined including, Jack Wheeler, and several other graduates of West Point to finance the construction of a memorial to those Americans who served or died during the Vietnam War. The memorial was not designed to make a political statement about the war itself. From this fund came the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, dedicated on Veterans Day, 1982, on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
John Maddox Roberts is an American author of science fiction, fantasy, and historical fiction including the SPQR series and Hannibal's Children.
Jan Craig Scruggs is a United States Army veteran who served in the Vietnam War, and later founded the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, which built the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., in the United States. Scruggs was the President of the foundation until 2015, when he retired.
Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam is a 1987 American documentary film inspired by the anthology of the same title, directed by Bill Couturié. The film's narration consists of real letters written by American soldiers, which are read by actors including Robert de Niro and Martin Sheen. The footage includes film from TV news, the Department of Defense and home movies by the soldiers themselves.
Randy Lynn Scruggs was an American music producer, songwriter and guitarist. He had his first recording at the age of 13. He won four Grammy Awards and was named Musician of the Year at the Country Music Association Awards three times. He was the middle son of Earl Scruggs and Louise Scruggs.
Joel L. Swerdlow is an American author, editor, journalist, researcher, and educator. His works include To Heal a Nation: The Story of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, co-authored with Jan Scruggs, which became a 1988 NBC movie. His articles have been published in American newspapers and magazines, and international publications have translated his work into more than three dozen languages for international publication. For ten years, he worked as a Senior Writer and Assistant Editor of National Geographic Magazine, and was the lead writer for the Magazine's 1998–1999 Millennium series.
Irene Scruggs was an American Piedmont blues and country blues singer, who was also billed as Chocolate Brown and Dixie Nolan. She recorded songs such as "My Back to the Wall" and "Good Grindin'" and worked with Clarence Williams, Joe "King" Oliver, Lonnie Johnson, Little Brother Montgomery, Blind Blake, Albert Nicholas, and Kid Ory. Scruggs achieved some success but today is largely forgotten.
John Parsons Wheeler III, known as Jack Wheeler, was an American businessman and former White House aide. Wheeler was chairman of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, senior planner for Amtrak (1971–1972), official of the Securities and Exchange Commission (1978–1986), chief executive and CEO of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, consultant to the Mitre Corporation (2009–death), and a presidential aide to the Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush administrations. He also held numerous other positions in the United States military, government, and corporations. He died under mysterious circumstances on December 30, 2010.
Marshall Colt is an American management consultant and combat-decorated, former captain in the United States Navy in San Diego, who was an actor in film and television from 1976 to 1995.
Scruggs is a surname, typically of Americans, but also documented in the United Kingdom, several of its other former colonies British descent is especially common, Germany, and Georgia.
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is a 2018 American Western anthology film written, directed, and produced by the Coen brothers. It had a limited theatrical release, being primarily intended for Netflix television. It stars Tim Blake Nelson, Tyne Daly, James Franco, Brendan Gleeson, Bill Heck, Grainger Hines, Zoe Kazan, Harry Melling, Liam Neeson, Jonjo O'Neill, Chelcie Ross, Saul Rubinek, and Tom Waits, and features six vignettes that take place on the American frontier.
Richard Jewell is a 2019 American biographical drama film directed and produced by Clint Eastwood and written by Billy Ray. It is based on the 1997 Vanity Fair article "American Nightmare: The Ballad of Richard Jewell" by Marie Brenner and the 2019 book The Suspect: An Olympic Bombing, the FBI, the Media, and Richard Jewell, the Man Caught in the Middle by Kent Alexander and Kevin Salwen. The film depicts the July 27 Centennial Olympic Park bombing and its aftermath, as security guard Richard Jewell finds a bomb during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, and alerts authorities to evacuate, only to later be wrongly accused of having placed the device himself. The film stars Paul Walter Hauser as Jewell, alongside Sam Rockwell, Kathy Bates, Jon Hamm, and Olivia Wilde.