Budd Saunders shared this letter to the editor with friends more than a week ago and it was published Saturday

Gotta give the newspapers first shot or they might think it is old news.
So here is what the Times published Saturday, pretty much as Budd wrote it.
Letters to the editor
Northwest Arkansas Times
Posted on Saturday, May 30, 2009
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/nwat/Editorial/76982/
Veterans could use the land
By the time this is published I will have attended the Memorial Day ceremony at the Fayetteville National Cemetery. The ceremony is to honor those who have served our country with honor. Many fought in our country's wars.
I was standing near the flag pole talking with a friend. He looked around and asked me how many friends of mine are buried in the cemetery. I thought a moment and said, "All of them." That sounds like false patriotism but it's quite true. I didn't know most of them personally, but attending memorials and funerals honoring their service makes them friends of mine.
Several years ago vandals sprayed red paint on 60 headstones. I went to see the damage. My eyes were burning with tears as I walked along looking over the scene. That act dishonored that garden of stone which is hallowed ground. The cemetery's crew and the volunteers worked in freezing weather, with a cold north wind blowing sleet into their faces. It was hard work, and it took three days to clean the bright, red paint from the headstones.
I wrote in an open letter to the Northwest Arkansas Times that I wanted to talk with the young boys who had done this terrible deed. That's all I wanted to do. Let them walk with me through the cemetery. I would read the headstones to them while I explained what they meant. For example, there's Clarence B. Craft, U.S. Army, Medal of Honor for Valor Above and Beyond the Call of Duty. There are veterans buried there from the Civil War, the Mexican border war, World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and more recently Afghanistan and Iraq. Many are unknown but still honored for their service.
Fayetteville has one of the few national cemeteries with room to grow, and the old sale barn area beside the cemetery is for sale. I am a member of the Regional National Cemetery Improvement Corporation. We raise money any way we can to buy land around the national cemetery. Earlier this year Milo Cumpston, one of the founders of our organization and a Marine survivor of Iwo Jima, arranged to purchase enough land to have burials until 2023. Milo was the last of the five veterans who founded the RNCIC.
Developers want to build student housing on the sale barn land. I don't know that students living near the cemetery will desecrate the cemetery, but there's a good chance they will. When we lived in Fayetteville years ago our home was across from Evergreen Cemetery. That is close to the University of Arkansas campus. Regularly I had to go over there and break up parties. Students damaged the headstones and grave markers. They meant no harm, but being young they didn't give it a thought if it was fun.
The RNCIC wants to purchase the land for the cemetery, but we don't know where to turn for the money. Can you help?
Budd Saunders
Durham