SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Mary Burgen still remembers how 48 years ago she could only stand and listen as the bad news of her son's death in Vietnam washed over.

Soldiers had walked up her driveway in Gouverneur in St. Lawrence County. She knew what they were about to say.

"I was at home with my daughter. She was about 10. And I seen the military guys come up the sidewalk to my door. And I knew then," she said. "He said, 'He didn't suffer.' I don't know why he said that.

"You just sit there. You just listen. You're in shock. You wish you didn't just hear what you were hearing."

Mary Burgen stands next to the new display honoring Gold Star Mothers like her at the Onondaga County War Memorial. The new display was unveiled Thursday.

Burgen, 92, was honored Thursday along with other mothers of soldiers killed in the line of duty at the War Memorial. The convention center unveiled a new display for Gold Star Mothers.

The glass-enclosed display has a life-like mannequin of a woman, dressed in white, with a somber expression and her hand over her heart. Below her is a folded flag like those given to family members of fallen soldiers.

Burgen's son, Errold Farrar, always wanted to join the military and felt it was his calling to fight in Vietnam, Burgen said. He shaved off his red hair, which she cherished, and enlisted. He became a Green Beret.

Farrar wanted to become a New York State Trooper when he came home, his mother said. His mother said he already had letters from the police agency promising him a job upon his return.

But on Dec. 23, 1969, Farrar and his fellow Green Berets were air-dropped on a mountain in Vietnam and quickly became involved in a firefight. A buddy of Farrar's wrote to Burgen after the war ended, telling her how her son was killed.

Burgen said her son and his fellow soldiers had already killed a "few of them." He stood up and began to speak, and then he was shot in the forehead.

"He stood up and he was talking and, boom," Burgen said.

Burgen said she spent four years or so distraught and then joined the Gold Star Mothers organization. It gave her a community and helped her feel productive with her grief.

She's been the Syracuse chapter's president and regularly appears at events honoring the military.

But she said she still feels the loss every day. She carries a photo of her son in her wallet and said she tears up often when she thinks about him.

"It takes time. That's the word: Time," she said. "But it never goes away. How can it?"