T-R PHOTOS BY ROBERT MAHARRY — Local artist Missy Sharer stands with her completed mural at the Marshalltown VFW Post 839 at 107 E. Meadow Ln. She wrapped up the project on Thursday afternoon.

Missy Sharer has lived almost all of her life in Marshalltown, and her father served in the Army. So, she thought, what better way to give back to her community and honor local veterans than to install a new mural at the VFW Hall?

“For me, it’s just a personal honor because I’m thrilled that I was chosen, and I also have a connection,” she said. “From that standpoint, it was kind of a personal thing.”

Sharer’s creation, which features a veterans cemetery on one wall and a soldier kneeling before his fallen comrade’s helmet, rifle and combat boots on the other, is the latest public art project to be completed in Marshalltown as of Thursday afternoon. The Marshall County Arts & Culture Alliance and the VFW under the leadership of Post Commander Rob Shepherd hatched the idea, and it quickly grew from there.

“This really honors our fellow fallen comrades. It’s just something to show the community how important it is to us,” Shepherd said.

Larry Tuttle, a member of the VFW chapter, said it took about three months to privately raise the necessary funds for the mural after discussions began with Arts & Culture Alliance Executive Director Amber Danielson, and Sharer was seen as a perfect match because of her background in creating patriotic paintings.

Sharer works on putting the finishing touches on the mural Thursday morning at the VFW.

“This is kind of in my wheelhouse, so I think Amber does a great job of dealing with all the different local artists and even the out-of-state artists that we bring in, and she has a real good feel for what everybody is capable of,” Sharer said. “I think maybe I was a good fit for it just because of my resume of what I’ve done.”

Danielson felt great about adding yet another piece of public art to the growing collection around Marshalltown, and this one was specially tailored to the participating organization.

“We were honored to partner with the VFW. It’s been an exciting project, and we’re excited to see local artists doing mural work in our community,” she said. “And a special thanks goes out to the community for supporting this project financially.”

Sharer started with a relatively small sketch and went from there, blowing it up into a massive canvas and completing the mural over three long but rewarding days of work. Blowing it up to scale can be a challenge, she said, especially because she was working on a corrugated wall.

This project was a bit more intense than most Sharer completes because, as she noted, she had some attentive “supervisors” from the VFW who had a specific vision for the mural and wanted to see it realized.

“It’s a very emotional subject for them, so that, in turn, makes it, for me, I’m more conscientious,” Sharer said.

In the end, however, everyone walked away happy, and the emphasis on honoring fallen soldiers is apparent in the finished product, with the veterans cemetery and the tribute to a deceased brother in arms taking center stage and more traditional patriotic items like a bald eagle and an American flag in a secondary position.

And if all goes according to plan, this won’t be the last art seen at the VFW Hall. A POW/MIA display is slated to go up on one of the others before long if the Post can raise the necessary funds.

“We ain’t done by a long shot, I’ll tell you that. There’s going to be more,” VFW member Rick Johnson said.

The mural can be viewed on the outside of the Marshalltown VFW Post 839 building at 107 E. Meadow Ln.

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Contact Robert Maharry at 641-753-6611 ext. 255 or

rmaharry@timesrepublican.com.