BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KBAK/KBFX) — A dark, shimmering room inside Bakersfield’s Portrait of a Warrior Gallery is dedicated to service members who never made it home, with tens of thousands of dog tags hanging from floor to 12-foot-high ceilings.
The one-of-a-kind display features 82,334 dog tags, including 127 from Kern County. The tags represent people who “never came home, either missing in action or were killed in some kind of conflict, or we don’t know if they were killed because they have not been relocated,” said Marc Sandall of the Portrait of the Warrior Gallery.
Sandall helped develop the idea to duplicate and display the dog tags of every service member missing in action or who never returned home since World War II. “People just have to be blown away when they come in here,” Sandall said. “I’ve taken a picture and tried to get support, but it doesn’t do it justice.” He added, “When they come in here, they can’t speak. Their jaws drop.”
The room includes speakers that faintly play the names of local service members. Each name is read by Bakersfield High School students, who say, “Bring me home.”
Sandall described the weight of the project and the lives represented by the tags. “And there have been so many Christmases and Halloweens and birthdays that they missed,” he said. “And so when I started doing these I though abou that I thought about all the- there are yesterdays that give for our todays. I’m sorry about that.”
The dog tags are arranged in 800 rows. Each chain on each tag was strung and hung by volunteers by hand. One volunteer described thinking about the people behind each tag and the families left waiting. “Every time I was putting the chain on, I would look at them. I would try to find out who they were. I just think about what their family is thinking: are they even going to have any type of closure,” the volunteer said.
Portrait of a Warrior Gallery in Kern County
The memorial is described as the only one like it in the world, with tags organized by conflict and home state.
The piece took nine years to create and was dedicated Aug. 25, 2025. Sandall said he believes the room should be seen widely. “I believe that every school, every adult, every human being in Kern County and the United States needs to see this room,” he said. He added, “And they come out changed. They are not the same person when they walked in.”