On “Gold Star Spouses Day,” the California Gold Star Memorial Monument committee will be holding a breakfast fundraiser to raise funds for a memorial monument at the new VA clinic in French Camp.
Tickets for the April 5 breakfast at Wine & Roses in Lodi cost $100.
The partnership with United Way of San Joaquin County and the Woody Williams Foundation will honor and remember loved ones lost while serving the country.
Tino Adame Jr., a U.S. Marine Corps veteran and a Stockton veterans advocate, said “when you lose someone, it’s devastating and for me to go and get some comfort there at the memorial will be great to have it there every day.”
The Purple Heart recipient hopes this will bring to local families “some type of peace, knowing that their loved ones are not going to be forgotten,” he said.
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The project will be made of granite and will cost more than $85,000.
“It’s a place of healing they can come and reflect,” said Mike Anderson, California Gold Star Memorial Monument committee chair.
He said it will represent San Joaquin County families and others in the region.
Anderson lost his only son when he was killed in Iraq in 2004 as a Marine in a gunbattle inside of a house, he said.
“This local committee is made up of local Gold Star mothers and fathers along with veterans that have served abroad. So, our heart is in it. This is something that’s going to happen,” Anderson said.
For more information or to make donations, visit: https://bit.ly/3IOgoNF
If you go
When: 7 a.m. April 5
Where: Wine & Roses, 2505 W. Turner Road, Lodi
Admission: $100 general admission
Information: visitstockton.org/events/california-gold-star-family-memorial-monument-breakfast-fundraiser/
Record reporter Angelaydet Rocha covers community news in Stockton and San Joaquin County. She can be reached at arocha@recordnet.com or on Twitter @AngelaydetRocha. Support local news, subscribe to The Stockton Record at https://www.recordnet.com/subscribenow.
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