VETERAN IS A STORY

Collections From The

Wayne D. Mutza of Milwaukee was honorably discharged from the U.S. Army during the spring of 1972, less than a year before the January 1973 signing of the Paris Peace Accords that ended U.S. involvement in Vietnam and the subsequent two-month troop withdrawal process that followed. Mutza’s story is just one of over 250 in the museum’s object collection relating to veterans who served during the Vietnam War. It also represents a period when U.S. troop involvement in Vietnam decreased significantly from a 1969 peak of nearly 550,000 to 69,000 troops by the time Mutza headed home in 1972.

After enlisting in 1969, Mutza served initially with the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, North Carolina prior to his tour. Upon his early 1971 arrival in Vietnam, SP4 Mutza served out of Camp Bearcat near Biên Hòa as a crew chief on a UH1H Huey helicopter (or “Slick”) with the 240th Assault Helicopter Company. He then transferred to Lai Khê to serve with F Troop, 4th Cavalry, 1st Cavalry Division as a helicopter crew chief/observer/gunner on a Hughes OH-6A Cayuse helicopter, a Light Observation Helicopter (LOH) whose acronym earned it the nickname “Loach.” Paired with one or two Bell AH-1G Cobra helicopters, his OH-6A Loach made up part of a hunter-killer team, with the Loach taking a risky, low altitude position to scout out enemy positions for the faster attack Cobras circling above. These types of missions proved to be some of the most hazardous and inherently dangerous of the Vietnam War.

Mutza returned with several personalized and locally-made items to document his 1971-1972 tour, including a “Wisconsin” labelled boonie cap depicting comic strip beagle Snoopy in Flying Ace character, flame-resistant Nomex flight shirt with theater-made Recondo patch (derived from RECONnaissance commanDO) reflecting his in-country specialized training, and a locally made patch from his time with the 240th AHC depicting the Huey he nicknamed “Nightmare” and a misspelling of his name to “MUZA,” which he explained as a common alternation by the Vietnamese due to a lack of “T” sound in their language. He also returned with a unique tigerstripe camouflage uniform in Vietnamese Marine Corps-type pattern which he acquired in a trade late in his tour.

Following his service, Mutza returned to the Milwaukee area and worked as a firefighter for nearly two decades with the City of Milwaukee. As an aviation historian, he has also authored over 30 books since the 1980s. Most focused on military helicopters and other aircraft of the Vietnam War era including the Loach and Huey. He is also a founding member of the Vietnam Helicopter Crewmembers Association.

By: Andrea Hoffman Collections Manager

By: Kevin Hampton Curator of History

OnJune 6, 1993

after more than 80 years at its location in the Wisconsin State Capitol, the G.A.R. Memorial Hall evolved into what is now the Wisconsin Veterans Museum and opened at a new location at the top of State Street on the Capitol Square. The move came after years of planning and packing, which included the mammoth task of retrofitting the Ben Franklin store that occupied 30 West Mifflin Street into an adequate space for a then-state-of-the-art museum.

While in the Capitol, the space was known primarily as the “Civil War Museum.” This moniker was based off its founding by Civil War veterans in 1901 and the fact that the 2,640 square feet of exhibition space primarily focused on the Civil War artifacts in the collection. Although there is a statutory mandate to also commemorate Wisconsin’s role in “any subsequent war,” and Wisconsin’s veterans stories provided plenty of opportunity, the G.A.R. Memorial Hall Museum lacked the room to expand.

Improvement initiatives focused on bringing the museum up to professional standards – including the hiring of the first professional curator – further demonstrated that the space was inadequate at a professional museum level. More important, the space in the Capitol impeded its ability to truly honor the World Wars generations, much less Korea and Vietnam, and those generations that follow. Ultimately, it was the limitations of space that dictated the necessity for either a significant redevelopment and modernization or a new location. In 1979 a modernization plan was rejected by the state legislature. Undeterred, the Wisconsin veteran community championed the development for a new museum space. In 1985 WWII veteran and Secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Veterans Affairs John Maurer secured a political agreement that allowed the museum to search for space outside the Capitol to develop exhibits incorporating the contributions of Wisconsin’s veterans in the 20th century. In 1989, Governor Tommy Thompson approved the acquisition of a new leased space across the street from the Capitol with the intent to purchase the location at some point in the future. For the first time in its history, the G.A.R. Memorial Hall Museum had an opportunity to create a more professional and engaging visitor experience with over 10,000 square feet of exhibition space.

The design team laid out an exhibit plan in a timeline approach from the Civil War up to then-current day. Generally, the timeline of events is a good approach as it meets the audience where they’re at in their understanding of history. The issue with that approach is that what defines present day is fluid. Unless you build in flexibility and room to expand, space constraints will catch up very quickly as time always moves forward. This truth was evident even from the date the G.A.R. museum closed from November 10, 1989 to when the Wisconsin Veterans Museum opened on June 6, 1993. In those 3.5 years at least 95 Wisconsinites died while serving. Our world changed significantly: the Berlin Wall fell, the Cold War was declared ended, the Soviet Union dissolved, Operations Just Cause (Panama), Desert Shield, and Desert Storm occured, no-fly zones over Iraq were established, and the first World Trade Center bombing occurred. Fortunately, there was time in the design phase to adjust for inclusion of those significant stories but the space available meant that future inclusion of stories from anything beyond the Desert Storm era would mean taking away from some other era’s stories.

As we know, history is always on-going and rarely cleanly stops like an end to a chapter in a book. Perhaps it’s even tragic coincidence that the day before the grand opening at 30 W Mifflin, there was an attack on UN forces in Somalia that ultimately led to the fateful events in Mogadishu that October which claimed the life of another Wisconsinite. Within those initial years, the timeline continued to grow and Wisconsin Was There: Bosnia, Kosovo, the Third Taiwan Straits Crisis, Operations Desert Strike and Desert Fox in Iraq, and those are just in the first seven years after opening that rounded out the decade and closed the millennium.

Nonetheless, the opening of the Wisconsin Veterans Museum in 1993 was a dramatic milestone in the institution’s history not only in terms of space, but also in terms of community engagement through the development of the new exhibits. Within the walls of the repurposed Ben Franklin store, large, beautiful murals were painted by nationally renowned military history artist Keith Rocco. Veterans, their families, and military history enthusiasts alike contributed material for the dioramas, and in some cases even posed as models for the mannequins. The Wisconsin National Guard was instrumental with the transport and installation of the oversized aircraft and vehicles that have become focal points of the displays.

And with the grand opening itself, the engagement of the community was as evident as ever. The speakers at the ceremony included Secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Jesse Brown, Governor Tommy Thompson, Secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Veterans Affairs Ray Boland, and others.

The Wisconsin National Guard’s 132nd Army Band played as helicopters from the Guard performed a flyover. Activeduty members of the 101st Airborne Division Parachute Demonstration Team performed a jump landing in the street in front of the new museum. Civil War reenactors paid tribute to the original generation of Wisconsin veterans that started the museum nearly 90 years before. Over 7,700 people attended the opening festivities that day. In his remarks, Governor Tommy Thompson summarized the significance of the museum and its symbolic meaning to our state’s veterans, their families, and all its citizens: “It’s absolutely essential to honor those who served… the museum is the story of Wisconsin veterans, of citizens called to arms… this museum is for you.”

Today the museum staff faces similar challenges as leaders did in the 1980s. How do we adequately tell the stories and honor our veterans from all eras of service as time passes? This is the question we consider daily as we strive to honor, commemorate, and affirm the role of all Wisconsin veterans in our nation’s military history: past, present, and future.