LEWISTON – An 8-foot-tall, 240-foot long replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial is set to arrive in Lewiston Sunday, preceded by as many as 2,000 motorcyclists and lots of tears.

The solemn motorcade could stretch for seven miles.

Once it is opened to the public, from Sept. 28 to Sept. 30, the wall is expected to bring round-the-clock visits from veterans and their families.

“You’ll find a guy there at 3 in the morning,” said Emmet Stuart, commander of the New Auburn American Legion. “They’ll stand there for hours sometime.”

The sheer enormity of all those 58,195 names – or the placement of a single name – can have a unique impact.

“You get a strange feeling when you’re there,” said Stuart, a Korean War veteran. “It’s very emotional.”

The visit by the wall, the largest of three replicas that tour the country, was the idea of local veterans.

One of the smaller versions of the wall visited Lewiston’s Kennedy Park in 2001. Veterans wanted a return.

So they approached the Fortin Group, the local affiliate of Service Corporation International, which owns and operates the big replica.

The folks at Fortin liked the idea. The company brings the wall to 20 cities a year. Their first call for local volunteers drew 40 people.

“It’s taken on a life of its own,” said Michael Martel, a spokesman for the Fortin Group. “We now have about 100 volunteers.”

And the plans keep getting bigger.

The motorcade was originally scheduled for Monday, but officials worried that it would interrupt traffic. So, it was moved to Sunday. In the process they made participation much easier.

The wall is expected to arrive in a single tractor-trailer. Its 48 panels will be assembled over three days.

Crews from the Lewiston and Auburn public works departments have spent a week preparing the wall’s site at Veterans Memorial Park, adjacent to Androscoggin River in Lewiston’s downtown.

A P-3 Orion from Brunswick Naval Air Station is planning a flyover for opening ceremonies on Sept. 28.

Among speakers during the three days will be Capt. George Womack, commanding officer of Brunswick Naval Air Station, and Maj. Gen. Bill Libby, a Lewiston native and the head of the Maine Army National Guard. He’s also a Vietnam vet.

He’ll be joined by fellow veteran Lewiston Mayor Laurent Gilbert. He spent a year in Vietnam, from November 1966 to October 1967.

Gilbert expects to recall a flood of images: from high school buddy Stanley Tunall, whose name is on the wall, to his work after the war for Continental Airlines. Often, his airline was tasked with taking the bodies of servicemen home, he said.

“We were constantly getting aluminum caskets for travel,” Gilbert said. “You just knew there was a family waiting for him to come home.”

They are the kind of memories that seem to surface near the wall.

To lend a hand, local counselors plan to staff a tent near the replica. If someone needs to talk, the veterans counselors will be able to meet with people privately.

In the end, much of the work is for the veterans and their families, who were often ignored during the war.

Gilbert believes people are learning.

“At least we welcome back our soldiers now,” he said.