Phantom Blooper
10-19-03, 08:12 AM
A Peacekeeper stands guard at memorial
October 19,2003
TIMMI TOLER
DAILY NEWS STAFF
He exists because others don't.
On the left hand is a wedding ring. In the right hand an M-16 rifle. The eyes keep watch - a look of determination frozen on the bronze face. He is 6 feet tall and stands over the names of the fallen listed on the Beirut Memorial wall.
To those who visit the site off Lejeune Boulevard, the statue is known as "The Peacekeeper." To Abbé Godwin, the artist who created it, the figure will always be "The Guardian of Freedom."
There are things today that Godwin can't remember about the statue, partly due to time and partly due to the emotions it evokes in her.
Godwin was born in Jacksonville but raised in Wilmington, still close enough to know Camp Lejeune and the Marine Corps. Her dad was in the Air Force, and when she chose a husband, she married a Marine.
She also grew up in a family that refused to be a part of the anger and speculation about the Vietnam War that permeated the country at the time. They kept her mindful of the military - of duty and purpose.
"I remember looking out our window when I was little. It was pouring rain, and these two young men were walking down the road, soaking wet. I could tell by their hair that they were Marines," Godwin said.
"My mom took them in. She knew they were good men."
They were men that Godwin has captured in sketches on paper and set free in bronze. Her sculptures are so realistic, they're often chilling.
She finished graduate school at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1975 and made a home there. She's been perfecting her craft ever since.
Creating "The Peacekeeper" wasn't a job she was sure she wanted at first. She had just finished "After the Firefight" at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Raleigh, a sculpture that depicts two infantrymen carrying a wounded comrade.
When Beirut Memorial organizers in Jacksonville contacted her in 1986 about creating a statue recalling the 241 troops killed in the Oct. 23, 1983 terrorist bombing of a military barracks, Godwin wasn't sure she would do it.
She visited Jacksonville and the memorial site at Camp Johnson where the memorial wall already had been constructed. She talked to people around the city.
"I remember that day very well," Godwin said. "Seeing the names on the wall that represented real human beings and what they did for this country - I wanted to do it because I knew what it meant."
But completing the job meant going back to that emotional well where she had spent the previous 18 months working on the Vietnam memorial.
"You're working long days and I don't mean in hours," she said. "It wakes up all sorts of feelings."
For the next 13 months, she worked on "The Peacekeeper." Her challenge was to make a standing figure that fit the existing memorial. Her goal was to create a point of departure from which people could think.
"The men and women for whom memorials like this are built deserve time for you to come and think about them," she said. "You honor people by the amount of time you are willing to give them. If anybody deserves that time and attention, these people do."
She last saw "The Peacekeeper" three years ago when she visited the area.
She'll see him again on Thursday when she speaks at the 20th observance of the Beirut bombing.
For Godwin, "The Peacekeeper" represents more than a monument to lives lost. He represents a shift in the tide of how the nation treats members of the military.
"I can't help but think of the contrast in the way our servicemen and women are seen now compared to what happened during Vietnam, Beirut and Grenada," she said.
"Beirut seemed to be the beginning of the mood of this country changing toward the military, but I feel like these men still didn't get the outpouring of love that they deserved.
"Now, especially after 9-11, it seems that love is now quick to be shown. The poignancy of that is sometimes hard."
October 19,2003
TIMMI TOLER
DAILY NEWS STAFF
He exists because others don't.
On the left hand is a wedding ring. In the right hand an M-16 rifle. The eyes keep watch - a look of determination frozen on the bronze face. He is 6 feet tall and stands over the names of the fallen listed on the Beirut Memorial wall.
To those who visit the site off Lejeune Boulevard, the statue is known as "The Peacekeeper." To Abbé Godwin, the artist who created it, the figure will always be "The Guardian of Freedom."
There are things today that Godwin can't remember about the statue, partly due to time and partly due to the emotions it evokes in her.
Godwin was born in Jacksonville but raised in Wilmington, still close enough to know Camp Lejeune and the Marine Corps. Her dad was in the Air Force, and when she chose a husband, she married a Marine.
She also grew up in a family that refused to be a part of the anger and speculation about the Vietnam War that permeated the country at the time. They kept her mindful of the military - of duty and purpose.
"I remember looking out our window when I was little. It was pouring rain, and these two young men were walking down the road, soaking wet. I could tell by their hair that they were Marines," Godwin said.
"My mom took them in. She knew they were good men."
They were men that Godwin has captured in sketches on paper and set free in bronze. Her sculptures are so realistic, they're often chilling.
She finished graduate school at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1975 and made a home there. She's been perfecting her craft ever since.
Creating "The Peacekeeper" wasn't a job she was sure she wanted at first. She had just finished "After the Firefight" at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Raleigh, a sculpture that depicts two infantrymen carrying a wounded comrade.
When Beirut Memorial organizers in Jacksonville contacted her in 1986 about creating a statue recalling the 241 troops killed in the Oct. 23, 1983 terrorist bombing of a military barracks, Godwin wasn't sure she would do it.
She visited Jacksonville and the memorial site at Camp Johnson where the memorial wall already had been constructed. She talked to people around the city.
"I remember that day very well," Godwin said. "Seeing the names on the wall that represented real human beings and what they did for this country - I wanted to do it because I knew what it meant."
But completing the job meant going back to that emotional well where she had spent the previous 18 months working on the Vietnam memorial.
"You're working long days and I don't mean in hours," she said. "It wakes up all sorts of feelings."
For the next 13 months, she worked on "The Peacekeeper." Her challenge was to make a standing figure that fit the existing memorial. Her goal was to create a point of departure from which people could think.
"The men and women for whom memorials like this are built deserve time for you to come and think about them," she said. "You honor people by the amount of time you are willing to give them. If anybody deserves that time and attention, these people do."
She last saw "The Peacekeeper" three years ago when she visited the area.
She'll see him again on Thursday when she speaks at the 20th observance of the Beirut bombing.
For Godwin, "The Peacekeeper" represents more than a monument to lives lost. He represents a shift in the tide of how the nation treats members of the military.
"I can't help but think of the contrast in the way our servicemen and women are seen now compared to what happened during Vietnam, Beirut and Grenada," she said.
"Beirut seemed to be the beginning of the mood of this country changing toward the military, but I feel like these men still didn't get the outpouring of love that they deserved.
"Now, especially after 9-11, it seems that love is now quick to be shown. The poignancy of that is sometimes hard."