Excited to report that my bill extending the Purple Heart Trail highway designation passed the Senate yesterday! Senate Bill 203 designates highways between Fairbanks and Homer and the entire Alaska Marine Highway System as the Purple Heart Trail. The designation serves as a tangible demonstration of Alaska’s appreciation for the sacrifices made by our wounded and fallen soldiers.
It was a special privilege have purple heart veteran Tim Armstrong in the Senate Gallery while we passed the bill. Tim was wounded while serving as an infantry machine-gunner in Vietnam and it is a picture of his Purple Heart medal that appears on all the signs along the highway.
The current Purple Heart Trail runs from the Alaska-Canada border to Fairbanks. With SB 203’s extension, the trail would run on a cumulative 4,500 miles of highway and marine highway, making it the longest Purple Heart Trail of any other state in the nation.
Original source can be found here.
