image description — The family of Lee's Michael Cornelius Whalen gathers around the the placard remembering him at Lenox's War Memorial Field on Friday.

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Ceremony Honors Sacrifice at Vietnam Traveling Memorial Wall

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
07:35AM / Saturday, July 12, 2025Print Story | Email Story

Vietnam veteran Woody Vaspra speaks at Friday's opening of the Vietnam Traveling Memorial Wall.

LENOX, Mass. — Like many of the people gathered on War Memorial Field on Friday morning, Cheshire's Lenwood "Woody" Vaspra could remember a time when remembrances of the Vietnam War were the last thing on Americans' minds.

"When Vietnam veterans returned home from Vietnam, there were no tributes, recognition, speeches, parades, even handshakes for us," Vaspra told the crowd gathered to open a weekend-long remembrance with the Vietnam Traveling Memorial Wall. "It was a very obscure re-entry into society. Many of the veterans came back either physically, mentally, emotionally or even spiritually broken — or a combination thereof. Some of them came back as POWs, who suffered many indignities while in captivity.

"It was not a very pleasant return for many of us who served in Vietnam. However, there were the fortunate veterans who were able to re-enter society, go to school, find a job and raise a family. But the Vietnam experience never went away."

And, through Sunday afternoon, visitors to War Memorial Field will have a chance to learn about and reflect on that experience.

The Vietnam Traveling Memorial Wall, like the Washington, D.C., memorial on which it is modeled, carries the names of 58,318 men who died over the nearly 20 years that America was at war in Southeast Asia.

While the ethics of the U.S. involvement in Vietnam are debated to this day, the sacrifice of the men and women who fought and died for their nation is undeniable.

On Friday, Vaspra was one of several Vietnam veterans who talked about that sacrifice and the war's impact on countless family members back home who lost their loved ones in the war.

William Sturgeon told the crowd that while most days, War Memorial Field is just a baseball field, he wanted them to treat it, this weekend, like sacred ground.

And at the outset of Friday's opening ceremonies, Rabbi Barbara Cohen and the Rev. Msgr. John J. Bonzagni gave invocations to set the tone for the event.

"Oh God, rich in mercy and compassion, we gather before you at this traveling wall, a symbol of sacrifice and remembrance, to honor the victims of the Vietnam War, their families, their loved ones and our nation," Bonzagni said. "Grant your healing touch to all who bear the scars of war — those who served, those who waited and those who mourn.

"Bring comfort to the hearts of families who lost loved ones and restore peace to the minds and spirits of veterans, who carry memories too heavy to bear alone. May this traveling monument inspire unity here among us, reminding our country of the cost of freedom and the importance of gratitude."

William "Smitty" Pignatelli, who was interim town manager in Lenox last summer when the planning of this weekend's display began, served as master of ceremonies on Friday morning.

The retired state representative thanked a long list of groups and individuals who made the weekend possible, including: Matthew and Hannah Keator, who led the fundraising effort to bring the traveling memorial to town; the Berkshire County Sheriff's Office for supplying portable lights to illuminate the wall over the next few nights; Dalton's L.P. Adams, for building the foundation on which the wall sits; electrician Scott Pignatelli for displaying the giant flag that greets people arriving at the site; the McCann Technical School students who created placards recognizing 27 Berkshire County residents whose names are on the wall; and Guido's Fresh Marketplace, which donated yellow roses to present the family members of those 27 heroes who were able to attend Friday's ceremony.

The day featured songs from Richmond native and Nashville, Tenn., artist Michael Fabrizio, a 21-gun salute from a local color guard of veterans and poetry, as delivered by Cohen, who read Archibald MacLeish's "The Young Dead Soldiers Do Not Speak" and Skip Hoskeer, who read Patrick Camunes' "From the Other Side."

Sturgeon offered a moving meditation on the meaning of the sacrifice that the traveling memorial honors.

"Today, we honor every name that appears on this wall," Sturgeon said. "Each one of them gave their life. Let's pause for a moment. Their life. What does that mean? As I remember it, one moment, they were like all of us right now. The next moment, they were gone.

"Their lives they thought they would live of being happy and alive and thinking of marriage and kids and maybe coming home and going to college and facing life's challenges that we all face — the good times and the bad times associated with living. They never got that opportunity. They never got the opportunity that we have of growing old."

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PCTV Turns 40, Anniversary Celebration This Friday

By Breanna SteeleiBekshires Staff
03:30PM / Monday, September 14, 2026

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Pittsfield Community Television is turning 40 this week, and it's celebrating with its viewers and listeners.

This Friday, Sept. 18, PCTV will celebrate at the Berkshire Hills Country Club. Ryan Peterson, WTEN News10 ABC anchor and Pittsfield High School graduate, will give the keynote address.

Executive Director Shawn Serre, who has been with the station for over 32 years, said it's their chance to celebrate all they have been able to bring to the community.

"It's a chance to reflect on everything that the organization has done over those years, all the people that have been involved. From board members to volunteers to producers to crew people to staff members, and all the different programs that we've produced," he said. "Everything from public programming to education, sports, graduations, parades, government meetings and forums, and election night coverage, and all kinds of other things that just year upon year of history that we've been able to create and document here for the Pittsfield community over those years."

Serre took over as executive director about nine years ago. Originally a volunteer fresh out of college.

The original board included former mayor Edward Reilly, Dan Dillon, Diane Morgenstern, Bernard Avalle, and John Fukes of the Berkshire Athenaeum. The operation was all-volunteer until PCTV hired the first executive director in January 1989.

PCTV has operated out of its station on Federico Drive since 1999. But originally they worked out of a basement.

"The first location that we ever had, we had all of our equipment stored in cardboard boxes in the basement of the Berkshire Athenaeum, because the Berkshire Athenaeum at the time was very gracious and allowed us to have some space while we sort of got our feet on the ground and sort of got things organized," he said. "But we had no location. We had no studio. We just had this equipment that was ordered with the money that we had from the original cable franchise grant."

"So that lasted a couple of years, and then we signed and got a lease over in our first studio location, which was over on Fourth Street in Pittsfield," Serre continued. "That was around the time that I first got involved, just before we moved to Fourth Street. So I was there in the basement of the library, opening those boxes up and seeing what we had for equipment. So we stayed there at Fourth Street for about 10 years, and then this building that we're currently in now, over on Federico Drive, was constructed in 1998. It was built kind of custom-made for the cable company and for us and for one other company."

Serre said one of their proudest moments was saving the radio station WTBR-FM back in 2018. PCTV made space for them so they could continue operation.

"We carved out some space here in our facility for that, and we've been operating that radio station ever since. So those are some of the big milestones of growth of the organization over the years, and the things that we've done," he said.

They have also invested in advanced technology to keep their programming accessible to all.

"Technologically, there's another whole series of things that we've gone through," he said. "We've started out with a single cable TV channel. We grew to three cable TV channels. We started out as standard definition on videotape, and we grew to digital, and then to high definition, and then everything went to the internet. So we're able to offer video on demand and live streams and video on social media. And then with the radio station, we also have a live stream there and podcasting. So we've seen a lot of technological change and tried to roll with that over the years."

Serre said that PCTV strives to keep people informed while also allowing space for people to create their own media.

"The whole idea behind PEG [Public Education and Government Access]...the whole idea behind that back in the 70s and 80s was that people could be left behind with the technology that's available to the big corporations," he said. "So, if you had a cable system at the time, ordinary people maybe they had camcorders at home, but they didn't have access to a TV studio; they didn't have access to the kind of technology that we had to allow them to create programs and share it with the community. So we filled that gap, and that was one of the main things that we did. And then also to be able to create programming for viewers and for the city, so that the municipal meetings can be shown, and so school committee meetings can be shown, and it really brings people in and involved."

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