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Etching a place in history
Bryan Carter has etched a place in history by applying engineering techniques of film
electronics to stone engraving. The result is 57,939 names on the Vietnam Veterans
Memorial in Washington, D.C.
A 1967 mechanical engineering graduate, Carter coordinated the etching of those names for
the monument’s unveiling in 1982. Since that time, the memorial has become one of the
top attractions in Washington, D.C.
Carter remembers when the monument was not so popular. “The memorial was highly
controversial in its design and there was much opposition to its completion.” The
controversy was such that the company Carter worked for at the time, Binswanger
Glasscraft, did not openly acknowledge it was working on it until the company had
completed the engraving.
With a crew of 27 people, Carter coordinated the engraving of 140 black granite stones
weighing up to 2,000 pounds each. Hand quarried from India, all stones were 40 inches
wide, measuring from seven to 10 feet high. The engraving took place in Memphis,
Tennessee.
The process involved using masking techniques Carter had learned working on thin-film
electronics with Western Electric. A form of high-tech stenciling, the masking process
applied to the stones allowed precision sandblasting to take place. The stones had to
match so when they were put together, the names would run straight for a total length of
500 feet.
Preparation for the project took six months and the actual engraving took 91 days. The
architects and designer believed the concept should be tested by actually doing the work,
Carter explained. So Carter’s team incorporated several practice stones into the
planning process. The crew then could test different cutting depths, angles on the letters
and grades of grit in the sand that would cut the names. The angles and depths of the
letters affected shadowing, which affects how well people can read them, according to
Carter.
“These people made over a hundred trips to Memphis to look at the stones in various
situations,” Carter said. They studied them outside at different times of the day to
see how various angles of light played on it. They poured water on it to see how the wet
surface affected readability of the names. “The key was if you drove in to Washington
from Mobile, Alabama, could you read it on a misty day?”
Apparently people can read the monument as the memorial has become the most visited
National Park Service site in Washington, D.C. Through October of this year, over 4
million people had visited the site, according to statistics supplied by the National Park
Service.
Carter, now president of a Memphis company called Glassical, has continued in the
“wall” business having worked on Vietnam memorials for Florida, Texas and
Tennessee. He also did the Korean memorial in Tennessee.
The Rose-Hulman graduate’s skills also have graced the big screen. He helped
re-create the D.C. wall for the set of a Bruce Willis movie titled “In Country.”
“If you watch the whole movie, I’m in the credits right after food
service,” Carter joked.
As president of Glassical, Carter’s career spans more than war memorials. Glassical
is the largest etcher of glass furniture in the United States. The company also works on
architectural applications of decorative glass for buildings and interior decorating
markets.
Photoetching has been a theme in Carter’s life beginning at Rose-Hulman. He served as
photographer for the Modulus yearbook and continued the process through his days in
thin-film electronics and then in memorial engraving. “I’ve always had one foot
in engineering and one foot in the artist’s colony,” he said.
— by Bryan Taylor
 
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