Denville May 2022

Page 1

No. 18 Vol. 5

www.mypaperonline.com

May 2022

Remembering Jim Vialard This Memorial Day

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By Steve Sears hyllis Vialard was married to her husband, Jim, for 50 years when he passed away on December 13, 2021. Still, he’ll always be present each day to his wife, especially at every Denville Memorial Day Parade. All she’ll need to do is take a look from the podium. As this year’s parade approaches, Phyllis feels her husband’ presence. “He said to me, ‘When you stand at the podium in Denville this year, you’ll be looking right at my grave. And I said to him, ‘I know it. You do not need to bring that up.’ After he died, for some reason that conversation popped into my head and I said, ‘Well, let me go see if what he said is right.’ And I went over to the flag pole and stood approximately where the podium is, and I was looking right over to my right, and there is his grave.” She viewed with pride the burial spot of a man whom, when he returned home in 1969 from Vietnam, for many years adorned burial spots of veterans with American flags in Denville and Rockaway. He first did so at the First Presbyterian Church in the latter town. “He loved the local history,” Phyllis says of Jim. “A Denville boy from the day he was born, his father died when he was 14. That made him ineligible for the draft for Vietnam. Because he was the sole surviving son, he couldn’t be drafted. He enlisted in the army, and he spent 26 months in Vietnam.” Vialard rose to the rank of Sergeant. “He was in the artillery; a ‘proud Red Flag’ was what they were called.” Vialard, who was exposed in 1967 to Agent Orange, suffered with diabetes, leukemia, and emphysema when he returned home to Denville, and his last days were spent attached to an oxygen tank, he 100% disabled. “We had been to the doctor on the eighth of December, and he, I, and my great niece were sitting here talking after his visit to the doctor,” his wife, whom he met in 1965, recalls. “And for whatever reason, the subject of his time in Vietnam came up. I looked at him - because clearly, he was suffering, and he died a short time later – and I said to him, ‘Do you regret it? Do you regret enlisting? Do you regret going?’ And he thought for about three seconds, and he said to me, ‘No, not one minute of it. It made me who I am, and I don’t regret it.’ He was very much a patriot.” Phyllis has been the Secretary of the Rockaway, Marcella, Denville Memorial Day Parade since 1980. The initial parade in Rockaway Borough goes back about 130 years, and services about 153 years. Jim started marching in the parade in 1969, when he returned home, joined the VFW Post #2519 of Denville, and also was a member

Some people live an entire lifetime and wonder if they have ever made a difference in the world. A Veteran doesn’t have that problem.” - Ronald Reagan

Thank you to our military past and present.

Jim Vialard in la Drang Valley, Vietnam in 1969. Photos courtesy of Phyllis Vialard.

of the RockDen American Legion Post #175. After he and Phyllis got married, she, also a member of RockDen, marched with him in the parade until the late 1990s, when both were transferred to Denville Memorial Post #390. “We were instrumental in planning the parade and the Rockaway, Marcella, Denville Memorial Association,” she says. As Phyllis took her place recently near the place where the podium will be this year, her eyes were on Jim Vialard’s spot of rest, and one succinct thought was on her mind and in her heart. “If anything, it has inspired me to make sure that the services we do in Denville - because he is right there, listening - I really need to make sure that I do it better, and that I make him proud.” This year’s parade in Denville (there will also be a joint Rockaway Borough Rockaway Township Parade at 11:15 a.m.) will be held on May 30th at 10 a.m.

Margaret A. “Peggy” Lefsky Broker/Sales Associate

973-727-0795 Cell 973-263-0400 Office www.peggylefsky.com

Check out my references! Zillow.com, Peggy Lefsky 91 Crane Road, Mountain Lakes, NJ 07046

973-263-0400

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Denville May 2022 by My Life Publications..Maljon LLC - Issuu