The long-anticipated day has finally arrived: the Vietnam Moving Wall is open to the public.

On Thursday afternoon, the Blessing of the Wall ceremony was held at Andersson Track across from the Wareham Middle School, heralding the official opening of the Moving Wall.

Rev. Cyril Offiong of Saint Patrick Parish in Wareham gave the blessing, quoting from Psalm 127: “If the Lord does not build the house, in vain do its builders labor.”

Offiong prayed that “the peace and love that they died for and which they served for would not be lost.”

Bob White, the chairman of the Wareham Veterans Council, said at the ceremony he hopes the Moving Wall will “heal the living who returned from the battlefields scarred and heal those who never left home.”

White advised everyone to remember those who died in the war to provide “a future far better than the alternative” for this country.

The names of over 58,000 men and women who died in the Vietnam War are listed on the wall, a half-size replica of the memorial in Washington, D.C. The Moving Wall is open 24 hours a day until Aug. 21. Click here for a full schedule of events.