Last week, as the nation took note of the 40th anniversary of the fall of Saigon on April 30, one island veteran made headlines in notable places.

Christopher Gaynor, who enlisted in the Army and served in Vietnam in 1967 and 1968, was featured in Time magazine and was interviewed by Tim Franks for the BBC News Hour, which airs throughout the world.

“I have not digested it yet,” Gaynor said last week. “I did not seek it. It has followed me into my quiet living room on Vashon.”

Gaynor is known to many on the island for the striking photos he took while serving in Vietnam and his award-winning exhibit of many of those photos, which hung in the Vashon-Maury Island Heritage Museum in 2011 and 2012. Many of those pictures have also hung in an exhibit at Café Luna.

Thirteen of those photographs were published online last week in Time magazine, along with a feature story on Gaynor. In the piece, “See the Photographs from Vietnam That Changed a Veteran’s Life,” Gaynor briefly recounts his journey to war, the photographs he took and his return to the United States — which he then fled because of the hostility to veterans that he encountered — as well as his current efforts to support veterans.

After the Time piece appeared, a representative from the BBC came calling, and Franks, the lead presenter of The News Hour, aired several minutes of an interview he conducted with Gaynor. Concluding, Franks asked him about the main lesson he would like to share from his war experience.

“My feeling is war is the ultimate last resort,” he said. “We seem to be too quick to jump into hostilities, armed hostilities, around the world without considering the consequences.”

Additionally, 31 of Gaynor’s photos are hanging in a Ventura County, California, exhibit commemorating the Vietnam War. Close to home, he has been promoting a documentary about war re-enactors called “In Country.” Last Thursday he moderated a panel discussion after the film was shown at SIFF Cinema in Seattle. The film is now available on iTunes and on DVD, Gaynor said, and seeking a larger audience.