California Memorial Cross Caretaker Receives National Honors

Henry Sandoz of Yucca Mesa, Calif., is the latest recipient of the Medal of Merit given by Veterans of Foreign Wars during their annual convention in San Antonio last week.

“I kind of teared up, and I don’t tear up easy,” said Sandoz, who was recognized for his commitment to the Mojave Cross Memorial. “The veterans are the ones to be honored, not me.”

World War I veteran Riley Bembry first erected a cross, a memorial to fellow veterans, on a rock pile in the Southern California desert in 1934.

Fast forward to 1983 when Bembry asked his good friend Sandoz for a favor.

“He said, ‘I would sure like to see somebody put it back up and also maintain it.’ I promised him I would look after it and do that,” said Sandoz.

Sandoz and his wife, Wanda, did just that for nearly 20 years.

It wasn’t always easy. There were problems with vandals. In the mid-1990s, Sandoz decided to put up a new cross.

“I decided I was going to do something different. I went ahead and cemented the inside. We welded it down. It was there to stay,” said Sandoz.

The Sandozes said vandals were bad, but the courts were much worse.

In 2002, the cross was covered with a plywood box as a legal battle raged on after a court ruled it was unconstitutional as a religious symbol on public land.

That’s when the Sandoz’s were no longer allowed to be caretakers of the cross.

Last year, the Supreme Court ruled the cross could stay. But days later, it was stolen.

“That was heartbreaking. We thought it was bad covered with the box. At least we knew what was under that box. It was still there,” said Wanda Sandoz.

A replica was then put up. But the Mojave Preserve removed it because it was not the original.

Sandoz remains optimistic a cross will go up again.

“I made another one. I’m waiting to put it up,” he said.