Oklahoma City National Memorial
Encyclopedia
The Oklahoma City National Memorial is a memorial in the United States
that honors the victims, survivors, rescuers, and all who were affected by the Oklahoma City bombing
on April 19, 1995. The memorial is located in downtown Oklahoma City
on the former site of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building
, which was destroyed in the 1995 bombing. This building was located on NW 5th Street between N. Robinson Avenue and N. Harvey Avenue.
The National Memorial
was authorized on October 9, 1997, by President Bill Clinton's signing of the Oklahoma City National Memorial Act of 1997. It was administratively listed on the National Register of Historic Places
the same day. The memorial is administered by Oklahoma City National Memorial Foundation, with National Park Service
staff to help interpret the memorial for visitors. The National Memorial Museum and the Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism are components housed in the former Journal Record Building on the north side of the memorial grounds.
The memorial was formally dedicated on April 19, 2000: the fifth anniversary of the bombing. The museum was dedicated and opened the following year on February 19.
parked a Ryder rental truck filled with explosives in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building
. The resulting explosion killed 168 people and destroyed the entire north face of the building.
Months after the attack, Mayor Ron Norick appointed a task force to look into a creation of a permanent memorial where the Murrah building once stood. The Task Force called for 'a symbolic outdoor memorial', a Memorial Museum, and for creation of Oklahoma City National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism. Six hundred and twenty four designs were submitted for the memorial and on July 1997 a design by Butzer Design Partnership, which consists of the husband and wife, Hans and Torrey Butzer was chosen.
On October 1997, President Bill Clinton
signed law creating the Oklahoma City National Memorial as a unit of the National Park Service
to be operated by the Oklahoma City National Memorial Trust. The total cost of the memorial was $29.1 Million; $10 Million for the Outdoor Symbolic Memorial, $7 Million for the Memorial Museum, $5 Million for the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism and the rest for other costs. The Federal Government appropriated $5 Million for construction with the State of Oklahoma matching that amount. More than $17 Million of private donations were raised.
On April 19, 2000 the fifth anniversary of the attack, the Outdoor Symbolic Memorial was dedicated. On February 19, 2001 the Memorial Museum was dedicated. The Oklahoma City National Memorial since its opening has seen over 4.4 million visitors to the Outdoor Symbolic Memorial and 1.6 million visitors to the Memorial Museum. The Memorial has an average of 350,000 visitors per year.
s (13,000 m2); it can be visited 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
The force of the blast ripped most of the branches from the Survivor Tree, glass and debris were embedded in its trunk and fire from the cars parked beneath it blackened what was left. Most thought the tree could not survive. Almost a year after the bombing, family members, survivors and rescue workers gathered for a memorial ceremony by the tree noticed it was beginning to bloom again. The Survivor Tree now thrives, as the Outdoor Memorial design included a mandate to feature and protect the tree. For example, one of the roots that would have been cut by the wall surrounding the tree was placed inside a large pipe, so it could reach the soil beyond the wall without being damaged. The decking around the tree was raised several feet to make an underground crawlspace; workers enter through a secure hatchway and monitor the health of the tree and maintain its very deep roots.
Hundreds of seeds from the Survivor Tree are planted annually and the resulting saplings are distributed each year on the anniversary of the bombing. Thousands of Survivor Trees are growing in public and private places all over the United States.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
that honors the victims, survivors, rescuers, and all who were affected by the Oklahoma City bombing
Oklahoma City bombing
The Oklahoma City bombing was a terrorist bomb attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995. It was the most destructive act of terrorism on American soil until the September 11, 2001 attacks. The Oklahoma blast claimed 168 lives, including 19...
on April 19, 1995. The memorial is located in downtown Oklahoma City
Oklahoma city
Oklahoma City is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma.Oklahoma City may also refer to:*Oklahoma City metropolitan area*Downtown Oklahoma City*Uptown Oklahoma City*Oklahoma City bombing*Oklahoma City National Memorial...
on the former site of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building
Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building
The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building was a United States Federal Government complex located at 200 N.W. 5th Street in downtown Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States. The building was the target of the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19, 1995, which killed 168 people, including 19 children...
, which was destroyed in the 1995 bombing. This building was located on NW 5th Street between N. Robinson Avenue and N. Harvey Avenue.
The National Memorial
National Memorial
National Memorial is a designation in the United States for a protected area that memorializes a historic person or event. National memorials are authorized by the United States Congress...
was authorized on October 9, 1997, by President Bill Clinton's signing of the Oklahoma City National Memorial Act of 1997. It was administratively listed on the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
the same day. The memorial is administered by Oklahoma City National Memorial Foundation, with National Park Service
National Park Service
The National Park Service is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations...
staff to help interpret the memorial for visitors. The National Memorial Museum and the Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism are components housed in the former Journal Record Building on the north side of the memorial grounds.
The memorial was formally dedicated on April 19, 2000: the fifth anniversary of the bombing. The museum was dedicated and opened the following year on February 19.
History
On April 19, 1995, Timothy McVeighTimothy McVeigh
Timothy James McVeigh was a United States Army veteran and security guard who detonated a truck bomb in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995...
parked a Ryder rental truck filled with explosives in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building
Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building
The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building was a United States Federal Government complex located at 200 N.W. 5th Street in downtown Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States. The building was the target of the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19, 1995, which killed 168 people, including 19 children...
. The resulting explosion killed 168 people and destroyed the entire north face of the building.
Months after the attack, Mayor Ron Norick appointed a task force to look into a creation of a permanent memorial where the Murrah building once stood. The Task Force called for 'a symbolic outdoor memorial', a Memorial Museum, and for creation of Oklahoma City National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism. Six hundred and twenty four designs were submitted for the memorial and on July 1997 a design by Butzer Design Partnership, which consists of the husband and wife, Hans and Torrey Butzer was chosen.
On October 1997, President Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
signed law creating the Oklahoma City National Memorial as a unit of the National Park Service
National Park Service
The National Park Service is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations...
to be operated by the Oklahoma City National Memorial Trust. The total cost of the memorial was $29.1 Million; $10 Million for the Outdoor Symbolic Memorial, $7 Million for the Memorial Museum, $5 Million for the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism and the rest for other costs. The Federal Government appropriated $5 Million for construction with the State of Oklahoma matching that amount. More than $17 Million of private donations were raised.
On April 19, 2000 the fifth anniversary of the attack, the Outdoor Symbolic Memorial was dedicated. On February 19, 2001 the Memorial Museum was dedicated. The Oklahoma City National Memorial since its opening has seen over 4.4 million visitors to the Outdoor Symbolic Memorial and 1.6 million visitors to the Memorial Museum. The Memorial has an average of 350,000 visitors per year.
Memorial features
The Outdoor Symbolic Memorial consists of the following segments on 3.3 acreAcre
The acre is a unit of area in a number of different systems, including the imperial and U.S. customary systems. The most commonly used acres today are the international acre and, in the United States, the survey acre. The most common use of the acre is to measure tracts of land.The acre is related...
s (13,000 m2); it can be visited 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
- The Gates of Time: Monumental twin bronzeBronzeBronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...
gates frame the moment of destruction - 9:02 - and mark the formal entrances to the Outdoor Memorial. 9:01, found on the eastern gate, represents the last moments of peace, while its opposite on the western gate, 9:03, represents the first moments of recovery. Both time stamps are inscribed on the interior of the monument, facing each other and the Reflecting Pool.
- The outside of each gate bears this inscription:
- Reflecting Pool: A thin layer of water flows over polished black graniteGraniteGranite is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite usually has a medium- to coarse-grained texture. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in which case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a porphyritic...
to form the pool, which runs east to west down the center of the Memorial (also see reflecting poolReflecting poolA reflecting pool or reflection pool is a water feature found in gardens, parks, and at memorial sites. It usually consists of a shallow pool of water, undisturbed by fountain jets, for a calm reflective...
) on what was once Fifth Street. Visitors' seeing their reflections are seeing "someone changed forever by what happened here."
- Field of Empty Chairs: 168 empty chairs hand-crafted from glassGlassGlass is an amorphous solid material. Glasses are typically brittle and optically transparent.The most familiar type of glass, used for centuries in windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, composed of about 75% silica plus Na2O, CaO, and several minor additives...
, bronzeBronzeBronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...
, and stone represent those who lost their lives, with a name etched in the glass base of each. They sit on the site where the Murrah Building once stood. The chairs represent the empty chairs at the dinner tables of the victims' families. The chairs are arranged in nine rows to symbolize the nine floors of the building; each person's chair is on the row (or the floor) on which the person worked or was located when the bomb went off. The chairs are also grouped according to the blast pattern, with the most chairs nearest the most heavily damaged portion of the building. The westernmost column of five chairs represents the five people who died but were not in the Murrah Building (two in the Water Resources Board building, one in the Athenian Building, one outside near the building, and one rescuer). The 19 smaller chairs represent the children killed in the bombing. Three unborn children died along with their mothers, and they are listed on their mothers' chairs beneath their mothers' names.
- Survivors' Wall: The only remaining original portions of the Murrah Building are the southeast corner, known as the Survivors' Wall, and a portion of the south wall. The Survivors' Wall includes several panels of granite salvaged from the Murrah Building itself, inscribed with the names of more than 600 survivors from the building and the surrounding area, many of whom were injured in the blast.
- The Survivor Tree: An American elmAmerican ElmUlmus americana, generally known as the American Elm or, less commonly, as the White Elm or Water Elm, is a species native to eastern North America, occurring from Nova Scotia west to Alberta and Montana, and south to Florida and central Texas. The American elm is an extremely hardy tree that can...
on the north side of the Memorial, this was the only shade tree in the parking lot across the street from the Murrah Building. Commuters arrived early to get one of the shady parking spots provided by its branches. Photos of Oklahoma City taken in the 1920s show the tree to be about 100 years old. The tree was taken for granted prior to the blast. Heavily damaged by the bomb, the tree survived after nearly being chopped down during the initial investigation, when workers wanted to recover evidence hanging in its branches and embedded in its bark.
The force of the blast ripped most of the branches from the Survivor Tree, glass and debris were embedded in its trunk and fire from the cars parked beneath it blackened what was left. Most thought the tree could not survive. Almost a year after the bombing, family members, survivors and rescue workers gathered for a memorial ceremony by the tree noticed it was beginning to bloom again. The Survivor Tree now thrives, as the Outdoor Memorial design included a mandate to feature and protect the tree. For example, one of the roots that would have been cut by the wall surrounding the tree was placed inside a large pipe, so it could reach the soil beyond the wall without being damaged. The decking around the tree was raised several feet to make an underground crawlspace; workers enter through a secure hatchway and monitor the health of the tree and maintain its very deep roots.
- The inscription around the inside of the deck wall around the Survivor Tree reads:
Hundreds of seeds from the Survivor Tree are planted annually and the resulting saplings are distributed each year on the anniversary of the bombing. Thousands of Survivor Trees are growing in public and private places all over the United States.
- The Memorial Fence: A 10 feet (3 m) chain link fence was installed around the area that is now the Reflecting Pool and the Field of Empty Chairs to protect the site from damage and visitors from injury. The Fence stood for more than four years, becoming notable as the place where visitors left stuffed animals, poems, keychains, and other items as tributes. During the construction of the Outdoor Memorial, 210 feet (64 m) of the Fence was moved to the west side of the Memorial, along the 9:03 side or the 'healing' side. The remainder of the Fence is in storage. Visitors may still leave small items along and in the Fence; the mementos are periodically collected, cataloged, and stored.
- Rescuers' Orchard: A grove of Oklahoma redbuds (Oklahoma's state tree), Amur MapleAmur MapleAcer ginnala is a plant species with woody stems native to northeastern Asia from easternmost Mongolia east to Korea and Japan, and north to southeastern Siberia in the Amur River valley...
, Chinese PistacheChinese PistachePistacia chinensis is a small to medium-sized tree in the genus Pistacia in the cashew family, Anacardiaceae, native to central and western China. It is hardy, can withstand harsh conditions and poor quality soils, and grows from 9-15 m, exceptionally up to 25 m...
, and Bosque Elm trees are planted on the lawn around the Survivor Tree.
- Children's Area: More than 5,000 hand-painted tiles, from all over the United States and Canada, were made by children and sent to Oklahoma City after the bombing in 1995. Most are stored in the Memorial's Archives, and a sampling of tiles is on the wall in the Children's Area. Chalkboards provide a place where children can draw and share their feelings. The Children's Area is north of the 9:03 gate, on the west side of the Museum.
- And Jesus Wept: On a corner adjacent to the memorial is a sculpture of Jesus weeping, erected by St. Joseph's Catholic ChurchSt. Joseph Old Cathedral (Oklahoma City)St. Joseph Old Cathedral is a parish church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma City located in downtown Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States. It was the seat of the Diocese of Oklahoma City from 1905-1931, and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978...
. St. Joseph's, one of the first brick-and-mortar churches built in the city, was almost destroyed by the blast. Not officially part of the memorial, the statue is regularly visited.
- Journal Record Building: North of the memorial is the Journal Record BuildingJournal Record BuildingThe Journal Record Building, also known as the Law Journal Record Building and the India Temple Shrine Building, is a Classical Revival style building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. It was completed in 1923 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980...
, which formerly housed the offices of the The Journal RecordThe Journal RecordThe Journal Record is a daily business and legal newspaper based in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Its offices are in downtown Oklahoma City, with bureaus at the Oklahoma State Capitol and in Tulsa....
. It now houses the Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum, which features numerous exhibits and artifacts related to the Oklahoma City bombing. Staff of the National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of TerrorismNational Memorial Institute for the Prevention of TerrorismThe National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism is a United States-based non-profit training and professional development center dedicated to improving the skills of police officers.-Role and focus:...
, a non-partisan think tank created shortly after the bombing by family members and survivors, also work here to spread knowledge of terrorism and its prevention.
- Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building Plaza: Located just south of the Field of Empty Chairs, above the underground parking garage, is the raised Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building Plaza. An original part of the federal building, the plaza had a garden and seating areas, as well as a playground for the daycare center. Visitors to the Memorial can walk across the plaza, where the original flagpole is used for the American flag.
External links
- Oklahoma City National Memorial Official website
- NPS website: Oklahoma City National Memorial
- NewsOK.com report and archive on the Oklahoma City Bombing
- Aerial view of the Memorial: Google Maps