The National Tragedy...That's Largely Forgotten

It was supposed to be just another ordinary Wednesday in 1995.  At the time, I was attending Emerson College and don't remember much about the first half of my day.  I probably took an early-morning commuter rail train into Boston because a look at my photography log book reveals that I went to Reservoir Station on the MBTA's Green Line to photograph two of the transit authority's old snow plow trolleys.  Then I helped a cute French girl at Copley Station find her way to the Museum of Fine Arts.  After class, I took an afternoon commuter rail train back home but since there were no smart phones in 1995, riders were blissfully unaware of the national tragedy that had occurred several hours earlier.  My dad, who was waiting to pick me up at the train station said, “They blew up a building.”
 
I found his statement puzzling.  They?  Who were they?  And what building?  In that moment, I couldn't fathom the level of destruction that would soon flash before my eyes during the television news coverage of the Oklahoma City Bombing.  In those days, the term BREAKING NEWS was not used so lightly.

Few people outside of Oklahoma City had ever heard of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building but now the ruins of this 9-story structure was burned into our minds.  At least 168 people were dead including three pregnant women and 19 children.  15 of those young victims had died in the building's day care center.  Almost 700 others were injured.  The April 19th tragedy would shake this nation to its core.

Many suspected Muslim terrorists were behind such a despicable act.  Just 12 years before, suicide bombers had killed 305 people at two military barracks in Beirut, Lebanon and the bombing of the World Trade Center in New York occurred only 2 year ago.  A voice for calm in the Boston area was Canadian talk show host Charles Adler who had a local television program called Adler On Line.  He urged people to wait for the facts and not jump to any conclusions.  On April 21st, we were shocked to see composite sketches of two white men labeled John Doe #1 and #2 on the front page of the newspaper.  As it turned out, the attack's mastermind wasn't some religious fanatic but an anti-government army veteran seeking revenge for the sieges at Waco, Texas and Ruby Ridge, Idaho.

People today often lament how divided society has become in recent years but I can tell you the 1990s had its fair share of divisiveness.  An infamous and poorly-timed fundraising letter from the National Rife Association sent out just days before the bombing referred to federal agents as “jack-booted thugs” prompting George H. W. Bush to resign his lifetime membership in May of 1995.  Some blamed talk radio for inspiring the attack and in a speech a week after the bombing, President Bill Clinton stated, “We hear so many loud and angry voices in America today whose sole goal seems to be to try to keep some people as paranoid as possible and the rest of us all torn up and upset with each other. They spread hate; they leave the impression that, by their very words, that violence is acceptable.”  One editorial cartoon at the time featured a take on the iconic photo of an Oklahoma firefighter carrying a dead infant...only a thought bubble was added that read, “Damn right-wing radio...”  The firefighter in question later said that was not what was going through his mind in that moment adding they regularly listened to Rush Limbaugh in the firehouse.  Even a tragedy of this magnitude could not stop elements of the left and the right from taking swipes at each other.

Like Pearl Harbor and the JFK assassination, the Oklahoma City Bombing was another “loss of innocence” moment for the United States.  I watched one television network's special on the terrorist attack and toward the end they paid tribute to the victims by flashing each one of their names on the screen with an accompanying photo.  The segment seemed to go on forever and it really underscored the true toll of the tragedy.  The website for the Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum has all of the victims listed here: https://memorialmuseum.com/experience/their-stories/those-who-were-killed/
 
In the years after the attack, there was talk of putting taggants in the type of fertilizer used to make the bomb but the idea was dismissed as being too costly and ineffective.  1998 saw the debut of The X-Files Movie: Fight The Future and a scene featuring the destruction of a federal building looked very similar to what we saw in Oklahoma City.  At the time, I thought it was tasteless and exploitative and I still do.  However, I wonder if younger audiences would even get the reference.  Last year, I posted a tribute to the bombing on a Catholic prayer website and one forum user who was in his 20s said he had never heard of it before.  How sad.  What are they teaching kids these days?

Unfortunately, the enormity of the 9-11 terrorist attacks just 6 years later overshadowed the Oklahoma City Bombing but I find many similarities in both tragedies:

* On April 19th, almost all of the victims were just going about their normal routines before their lives were cut short.

* Stories of heartbreak and near misses emerged: One man who was supposed to be at the Murrah Building that morning overslept and was running late which saved his life.  A woman who was in a meeting with her fellow co-workers survived the blast while everyone else was killed.  A man lost his life because he decided to drop by the Federal Building at the last minute to have some paperwork processed.  Three people died in other buildings, one was killed in a parking lot across the street and a rescue worker lost her life in the aftermath of the attack from injuries sustained by falling debris.

* A city's skyline changed forever and for a time the site of the Murrah Building was referred to as ground zero.  A fitting memorial preserving the lost structure's footprint took years to complete and features thoughtful symbolism as well as a survivor tree.

* Tighter security measures were instituted and in Boston I saw jersey barriers go up at various government buildings.

* There were calls for prayer.  One Boston Herald editorial written by Joe Fitzgerald urged us to hold onto our religious convictions and not call on God only when we needed something from Him in a time of crisis.  The uncredited AP photo of two Oklahoma teens at a prayer service appeared in his poignant article and is the first image in this blog entry.

I tend to remember the anniversary of the Oklahoma City Bombing only because April 19th coincides with a personal anniversary of mine but this year, it almost slipped by me.  There wasn't any coverage in the news and no one in my life could tell me what had taken place on that day 27 years ago.  9-11 is certainly much easier to remember because the date of the attack is actually in its name.  What happened at New York's World Trade Center also unfolded on live television and was captured from many different angles making those memories all the more gut wrenching. 

In some respects, the world is a much different place than it was in 1995.  Just when you think we're starting to learn from the past, humanity keeps raising the bar when it comes to violence and gore.  School shootings...mass shootings...and now the wholesale slaughter of civilians in Ukraine.  Perhaps we've become a little numb to other people's misery or maybe we feel helpless to change things for the better.

Last year, I found more than a few articles on the internet discussing how the Oklahoma City Bombing has faded into the distant background of our collective consciousness.  I hope what's written here helps us all remember a little more easily.  We owe it to the victims and to ourselves.