Family trips aren’t always conducive to finding those unique places that are either interesting, affective or both. But my wife’s family is from Oklahoma and Texas, and both states offer places that we visit when we are in the area.
Above is one of the empty chairs from the Oklahoma City National Bombing Memorial, and it’s a site I’ve visited a few times now. I’m sure most people out there know the story (or you can find more information here), and the memorial is a beautiful, respectful area in downtown Oklahoma City.
I think as an artist and, more simply, as a person, visiting places like this are important. Not only to remember what happened before, and to see a part of history, but to simply remind us that we can’t forget that there is true evil in the world. Evil that must always be fought against.
For me personally, I visited the site a month and a half after it happened in 1995. It was early on a Sunday morning, a little over a week after the building had been imploded to prevent further collapse. It was eerily quite that morning, and the immense power of the place was evident even then.
Below are a few photos of the site I took, as my daughter and I walked around. She took a few pictures herself with our other camera, but she really just looked. I think history is important for our children to learn, and I don’t think they get enough of it in school. I also think when they get the chance to see a place that’s important in our history that we should encourage them to see it, to ask questions, and, simply, to remember.
