Alaska’s first official Freedom Rock honoring veterans is painted and just awaiting setup at its future home at Wrangell’s City Park.
Moving the 6-foot boulder from its storage space at the Marine Service Center will present its own challenge, said J.R. Meek, marketing and community development coordinator for the borough, which paid for and managed the veterans memorial project.
Iowa artist Ray “Bubba” Sorensen II, who the borough hired to paint the memorial, advised against applying any protective spray or sealant to the rock.
“He also told us not to use any blankets or things like bubble wrap on the surface, because it might damage the paint,” Meek said of the move. “So, the real challenge will be transporting it. We’re going to have to get something worked out for that.”
The Wrangell artwork is Sorensen’s 11th Freedom Rock around the country.
Site preparation is underway at City Park. Borough crews have poured a concrete pad where the boulder will sit on a metal bracket. Plans also call for a protective shelter over the rock and a perimeter fence to prevent people from climbing on it.
The Freedom Rock will be permanently installed in City Park later this year, with an official community unveiling planned this fall.
The front of the artwork honors the Alaska Native Tlingit Code Talkers. “During World War II, Tlingit servicemen used their native language to transmit military communications that enemy forces were unable to decipher. Like the more widely known Navajo Code Talkers, their service remained largely secret for many years after the war,” Sorensen explained.
One side of the rock features veteran Matt More, a former teacher and now Wrangell police officer.
The other side is a tribute to the late Sgt. Harold M. Snoddy, of Wrangell, who was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Army’s second-highest award for valor, for his actions in battle and rescuing wounded soldiers during fighting in the Vietnam War in 1969. Snoddy died in December 2023.
The back of the rock features tributes to two more veterans: Louis F. Paul Jr., of Wrangell, who was killed near the end of World War II when his aircraft crashed after operations in Italy, and Mark Owen, the pen name of former Navy SEAL Matt Bissonnette, who grew up in rural Alaska and who participated in the 2011 mission that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden.
