Phoenix breaks ground on 9/11 memorial

Design uses light to highlight phrases, pieces from the tragedy
John Faherty and Carrie Watters The Arizona Republic May. 9, 2006 12:00 AM
It's easy to forget how hard it is to remember. That's why ground was broken Monday for Arizona's Sept. 11 Memorial at the state Capitol.Steve Speisman will never forget that day. Neither will his parents, Jack and Joyce.

Donna Bird will carry 9/11 with her for the rest of her life. So, too, will Philip Manning. Those people all lost a son or brother or husband when the planes started crashing. But they, like us, will not be here forever. Eventually, our memories will fade, and then we will be gone. For future generations, it will be a lesson in history classes. Clearly, people will know about the losses of the day. They will know the numbers. They will know about the wars. But will they remember the moment? The shock and fear? The coming together as a nation?Those are the things that will be honored by the memorial at Wesley Bolin Memorial Plaza. The goal is to have it completed by this Sept. 11. The state's 9/11 Memorial Commission chose a design that uses sunlight to illuminate phrases about the 2001 terrorist attacks and how they affected people in Arizona. The memorial will be circular, with a solid concrete base. Above it is a steel visor with words cut into the metal. As the sun shines down, light will stream through, projecting the words onto the concrete below. Sections of phrases will come into focus at different times of the day and year depending on the sun's angle. And only on Sept. 11 each year will it fully illuminate an 18-inch piece of a steel beam from the 44th floor of Tower One of the World Trade Center. The memorial is expected to cost about $450,000. All the money was privately raised and no public funds will be used to build or maintain the monument. A primary motivation in the design of the memorial is educational.

There will be timelines to help people understand the events of the day, but there will also be phrases to help people in the years to come to understand the emotion of the time. "There will be no memorial in the country quite like this one," said Gov. Janet Napolitano, who called the design unique, bold and dynamic.Bird, whose husband, Gary, died in Tower One, was among those at the groundbreaking.The Tempe resident could not help but compare the memorial to the recent conviction of Zacarias Moussaoui, the only man charged in the tragedy of Sept. 11. He will be in the darkness of a prison without human companionship, Bird said. She called the memorial a celebration of warmth and light."We have to be a people who believe that evil always finds its way to darkness, but goodness finds its way to light."