By ERICH HINER, Scripps Howard News Service

WASHINGTON - A new law will lift the 94-year-old ban on carrying loaded firearms in national parks and wildlife refuges when it goes into effect Monday.

The law, passed by Congress in May as an amendment to a credit-reform bill, will end the ability of the National Park Service to set its own gun-carry restrictions, making each park subject to the gun laws of its home state.

WASHINGTON - Vietnam War veteran John Burnam has fought for almost a decade for a monument to honor his closest friend from the war.

Burnam's buddy spotted enemy patrols, scouted hostile territory and led a platoon of Marines through an orchard laced with hidden explosives -- all using little more than his sense of smell.