BELDING — Denny Craycraft updated the Belding City Council on the status of the Veterans Park at Tuesday night’s meeting.

Veterans Park is located immediately west of the depot building in downtown Belding. The park features the Freedom Wall, an incarnation of the original wall that was torn down 64 years ago. The wall bears the names of more than 700 area veterans who fought and served during World War II.

According to Craycraft, who spearheaded the effort to see the Freedom Wall constructed and finished last November, $2,000 of the $5,800 for the newest monument is still left to be paid by the end of September.

Craycraft said he is looking into adding a Korean monument, which will cost approximately $7,100.

“After the first monument is paid for, we’ll begin working on that one,” he said.

Craycraft said 3,200 square foot of sod will be coming this week to be placed around the monuments.

“That is going to make everything look a lot better,” he said.

He added that he was looking into staining the cement base of the park a sand color and texture, as was originally planned.

Craycraft said that he would like to see a security camera placed near the depot overlooking the new park.

I’m an optimist because I do believe that our kids and our community realize this is sacred ground,” he said. “No one has messed with it so far, but we’ve invested a lot of money, close to $100,000. I’d hate to see anything happen and not have anyone be responsible.”

Cory is the current Belding beat reporter for The Daily News, as well as the multimedia reporter, producing video and photo content for the paper's website. Cory is a hometown kid, having graduated from Greenville High School in 2004. He then went on to study Journalism at Michigan State University where he also played trumpet and marched as a member of the Spartan Marching Band for four years.

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More than 64 years ago, veterans in the Belding area celebrated Memorial Day by marching through the streets of the city and holding a ceremony at the original Freedom Wall located on the corner of Bridge and Main streets. Now, years after that wall was decommissioned, leading to holding Memorial Day ceremonies in various locations including the Veterans Memorial Bridge and Riverside Cemetery, veteran and Belding resident Denny Craycraft is proud to see that once again, Belding has a central location in Veterans Park for the community to come together and honor its veterans.

What originally began as an effort to resurrect a freedom wall to honor area veterans in Belding has grown into much more in just four short months. By Memorial Day 2012, Denny Craycraft, the Belding veteran spearheading the freedom wall project, is hoping to officially break ground on the first phase of constructing a veterans park in Belding.

The Veterans Freedom Wall, which once stood at the corner of Main and Congress streets until it was decommissioned in 1948, will officially live on in the newly constructed wall located on Depot Street just west of the Pere Marquette Depot in Belding. At 11 a.m. Sunday, Veterans Day, a ceremony dedicating the new wall will take place, unveiling the wall 64 years to the day that the original wall was destroyed.

For several moments Sunday morning, Belding resident and World War II veteran John Geisen stood quietly just a few feet in front of the new Belding Freedom Wall memorial as people shuffled around him. Staring at the newly dedicated wall, built in memory of area WWII veterans, Geisen’s eyes began to glass over with tears. With a deep breath, he then took a few steps closer to the wall.