Phantom Blooper
10-19-08, 05:42 AM
Beirut Remembered
October 19, 2008 - 12:48AM
JENNIFER HLAD (jhlad@freedomenc.com)
The Daily News
<!-- Video goes here -->Many of the Marines were still asleep the morning of Oct. 23, 1983, when a hijacked water delivery truck filled with thousands of pounds of explosives plowed into the entryway of the 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment headquarters in Beirut, Lebanon. When the suicide bomber detonated the truck, the force of the blast caused the four-story building to collapse.
Two hundred forty-one Marines, 18 sailors and three soldiers were killed in the attack. Nearly all of those men had been stationed at Camp Lejeune.
Ron Bower had just moved to Jacksonville, but he saw the impact the bombing had on his new community.
"It was such a catastrophic event to the people who were here," said Bower, also a member of the Beirut Memorial Advisory Board. "If you weren't related to one of these Marines, you knew one of them. Everyone knew someone."
The trees
The City of Jacksonville Beautification and Appearance Commission already had a program in place for citizens to donate money and have a tree planted in someone's honor. So when the news of the terrorist attack shattered the peace of that Sunday morning in Jacksonville, it didn't take long for the commission to decide it would plant many more trees - one for each service member who died on the peacekeeping mission in Beirut.
Mike Ellzey worked for the city at the time, and is a member of what is now the Beirut Memorial Advisory Board. He remembers the Beautification and Appearance Commission decided that day, the afternoon of Oct. 23, to plant a tree for each of them - not just the service members killed in the bombing, but everyone who had served and died in Beirut.
They were, after all, "our neighbors," Ellzey said.
A local teacher, Martha Warren, had read about the trees in the newspaper and began raising money with her students for one tree. The fund-raising project grew, and soon the commission was receiving hundreds of dollars in donations.
The trees were dedicated in March of 1984, Ellzey said. Then, the chairwoman of the Beautification and Appearance Committee, Doris Downs, decided it would be nice to have a plaque explaining the trees. She asked Camp Lejeune for a small piece of land on which to put the plaque. They gave her four and a half acres.
The memorial
The commission solicited designs for a memorial, and received about 40 submissions, Ellzey said. Together with the base's commanding general, they chose two - one for a stone memorial, another for landscaping. Then they began raising money.
"That went really slowly," Ellzey remembers. "It all but died. Until 1986, we were getting money in dribbles and drabs."
Finally, in 1986, Downs asked the Jacksonville City Council to create a blue-ribbon committee of local businessmen to help get over the fundraising hurdle, Ellzey said. By May of 1986, the commission had the money it needed.
Construction began immediately, and Ellzey remembered laying brick in the walkway the morning of Oct. 23, 1986. But later that day, the third anniversary of the bombing, the memorial was dedicated.
The 10-foot by 64-foot wall has two parts. One half bears 271 names. The other has just four words: They came in peace.
The statue
The memorial wall is broken in two parts to symbolize the explosion. In the middle is a pedestal. But in 1986, the pedestal was empty.
After the memorial's dedication, the memorial advisory group began searching for a sculptor. They kept coming back to Abbe Godwin, who had created the Vietnam memorial in Raleigh and lived in Greensboro.
Ellzey said the group asked Godwin to come down and look at the memorial. At the time, they only had about $60,000, far short of the $100,000 or more a statue like that normally cost. But after spending a few hours at the memorial, Godwin agreed to do it for the money the memorial board had already raised, Ellzey said.
Godwin started almost immediately, sculpting the statue in clay before sending the pieces to New York to be cast. "The Peacekeeper" was dedicated in October 1988.
Today, 271 Bradford pear trees grow along N.C. 24. When they bloom, "it looks like it's snowing on Lejeune Boulevard," Bower said.
And at the crossroads between downtown Jacksonville and Camp Johnson stands the memorial, a silent tribute to the service members and community members who served in Beirut.
"I think when the bombing happened, everybody recognized that they were our neighbors," Ellzey said. 'They live in town, they were our soccer coaches, they were in our Sunday school class. ... None of us should ever forget."
Contact interactive content editor Jennifer Hlad at 910-219-8467 .
October 19, 2008 - 12:48AM
JENNIFER HLAD (jhlad@freedomenc.com)
The Daily News
<!-- Video goes here -->Many of the Marines were still asleep the morning of Oct. 23, 1983, when a hijacked water delivery truck filled with thousands of pounds of explosives plowed into the entryway of the 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment headquarters in Beirut, Lebanon. When the suicide bomber detonated the truck, the force of the blast caused the four-story building to collapse.
Two hundred forty-one Marines, 18 sailors and three soldiers were killed in the attack. Nearly all of those men had been stationed at Camp Lejeune.
Ron Bower had just moved to Jacksonville, but he saw the impact the bombing had on his new community.
"It was such a catastrophic event to the people who were here," said Bower, also a member of the Beirut Memorial Advisory Board. "If you weren't related to one of these Marines, you knew one of them. Everyone knew someone."
The trees
The City of Jacksonville Beautification and Appearance Commission already had a program in place for citizens to donate money and have a tree planted in someone's honor. So when the news of the terrorist attack shattered the peace of that Sunday morning in Jacksonville, it didn't take long for the commission to decide it would plant many more trees - one for each service member who died on the peacekeeping mission in Beirut.
Mike Ellzey worked for the city at the time, and is a member of what is now the Beirut Memorial Advisory Board. He remembers the Beautification and Appearance Commission decided that day, the afternoon of Oct. 23, to plant a tree for each of them - not just the service members killed in the bombing, but everyone who had served and died in Beirut.
They were, after all, "our neighbors," Ellzey said.
A local teacher, Martha Warren, had read about the trees in the newspaper and began raising money with her students for one tree. The fund-raising project grew, and soon the commission was receiving hundreds of dollars in donations.
The trees were dedicated in March of 1984, Ellzey said. Then, the chairwoman of the Beautification and Appearance Committee, Doris Downs, decided it would be nice to have a plaque explaining the trees. She asked Camp Lejeune for a small piece of land on which to put the plaque. They gave her four and a half acres.
The memorial
The commission solicited designs for a memorial, and received about 40 submissions, Ellzey said. Together with the base's commanding general, they chose two - one for a stone memorial, another for landscaping. Then they began raising money.
"That went really slowly," Ellzey remembers. "It all but died. Until 1986, we were getting money in dribbles and drabs."
Finally, in 1986, Downs asked the Jacksonville City Council to create a blue-ribbon committee of local businessmen to help get over the fundraising hurdle, Ellzey said. By May of 1986, the commission had the money it needed.
Construction began immediately, and Ellzey remembered laying brick in the walkway the morning of Oct. 23, 1986. But later that day, the third anniversary of the bombing, the memorial was dedicated.
The 10-foot by 64-foot wall has two parts. One half bears 271 names. The other has just four words: They came in peace.
The statue
The memorial wall is broken in two parts to symbolize the explosion. In the middle is a pedestal. But in 1986, the pedestal was empty.
After the memorial's dedication, the memorial advisory group began searching for a sculptor. They kept coming back to Abbe Godwin, who had created the Vietnam memorial in Raleigh and lived in Greensboro.
Ellzey said the group asked Godwin to come down and look at the memorial. At the time, they only had about $60,000, far short of the $100,000 or more a statue like that normally cost. But after spending a few hours at the memorial, Godwin agreed to do it for the money the memorial board had already raised, Ellzey said.
Godwin started almost immediately, sculpting the statue in clay before sending the pieces to New York to be cast. "The Peacekeeper" was dedicated in October 1988.
Today, 271 Bradford pear trees grow along N.C. 24. When they bloom, "it looks like it's snowing on Lejeune Boulevard," Bower said.
And at the crossroads between downtown Jacksonville and Camp Johnson stands the memorial, a silent tribute to the service members and community members who served in Beirut.
"I think when the bombing happened, everybody recognized that they were our neighbors," Ellzey said. 'They live in town, they were our soccer coaches, they were in our Sunday school class. ... None of us should ever forget."
Contact interactive content editor Jennifer Hlad at 910-219-8467 .