Jan Scruggs

Jan Scruggs started and directed the enormously successful effort to create a national memorial honoring those Americans who served their country in the Vietnam War.

Scruggs went to Vietnam with the U.S. Army's 199th Light Infantry Brigade after graduating from high school. Wounded and decorated for gallantry, he returned home to obtain a Master's Degree in counseling from American University in Washington, D.C. The idea for a memorial inscribed with the names of those who fell in Vietnam came while doing graduate school research on veterans of the war.

Starting with $2,800 of his own money, Scruggs initiated the memorial project in 1979 after Congress failed to act. Despite controversy and numerous setbacks, the endeavor raised more than $8 million -- all of it from private sources. Many political hurdles later, the Memorial was finally dedicated in November 1982.

Since then, Scruggs has appeared on numerous national and local television and radio programs including 60 Minutes, Nightline and Good Morning America. To Heal A Nation, his book about the Memorial, was made into an NBC movie of the week broadcast in May 1988. He has also written articles on a wide variety of topics for the Washington Post and other distinguished publications.

Scruggs is one of America's most successful motivational speakers whose business audiences include AT&T, AETNA, and the Million Dollar Roundtable. He also lectures to college audiences about the Vietnam War and the Memorial and serves as Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund.