Here you go!
Posted on 09/14/2005 4:54:48 PM PDT by jimbo123
The architect of the memorial to a plane downed in Pennsylvania on Sept. 11, 2001, said Wednesday he would work to satisfy critics who complained that it honors terrorists with its crescent-shaped design.
Designer Paul Murdoch said he is "somewhat optimistic" that the spirit of the design could be maintained.
"It's a disappointment there is a misinterpretation and a simplistic distortion of this, but if that is a public concern, than that is something we will look to resolve in a way that keeps the essential qualities," Murdoch, 48, of Los Angeles, said in a telephone interview.
Murdoch's design, "Crescent of Embrace," was selected last week during a meeting of the Flight 93 Advisory Commission from five narrowed down from 1,011.
The recommendation of the 15-member jury consisting of design professionals and family and community members still needs to be approved by the Interior Department.
Its shape is a circle broken by the flight pattern of the plane, which supporters have said follows the topography of the crash site.
Chris Martin, spokesman for Flight 93 National Memorial, said Wednesday family members and federal advisory commission members turned to Murdoch for assistance.
Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., sent a letter Tuesday to National Park Service Director Fran Mainella saying many have questioned the shape "because of the crescent's prominent use as a symbol in Islam — and the fact that the hijackers were radical Islamists."
Will Adams, spokesman for Tancredo, said Wednesday Tancredo would be happy with the changes only if the crescent shape is removed.
Murdoch said he's not sure exactly what changes he would make.
The memorial also consists of a chapel with 40 metallic wind chimes — one for each victim. It would include pedestrian trails and a roadway to a visitor center and the actual crash site. At the site would be a crescent-shaped cluster of maple trees and a white marble wall inscribed with the victims' names.
"We called it a crescent because it was a curving land form. We called it 'Crescent of Embrace' because of the symbolic gesturing of embracing this place," Murdoch said. "There's no desire to make this a divisive memorial."
Gordon Felt, of Remsen, N.Y., whose brother Edward Felt was killed on Flight 93, said he called Tancredo's office and said Tancredo should have held off on his criticism.
"I wish he would come out to Somerset and see topography of the land," Felt said.
Felt said it is natural for the design to evolve.
"I think the topography of the land would really dictate there would be some kind of arc," Felt said.
Flight 93 was flying to San Francisco from Newark, N.J., when it was hijacked and crashed 65 miles outside Pittsburgh. The official 9/11 Commission report said the hijackers crashed it as passengers tried to take control of the cockpit.
Where is this field full of swastika crosses???
I guess we are smarter than him, aren't we?
Just look for the nearest Palestinian cemetary...
Ditto...
And how about this BS?:
"We called it a crescent because it was a curving land form. We called it 'Crescent of Embrace' because of the symbolic gesturing of embracing this place," Murdoch said. "There's no desire to make this a divisive memorial."
I'd like to apply a vice-like "embrace" to Murdoch's neck as more than a "symbolic gesture."
And if you don't like the new one, you will be sent to sensitivity training.
Photoshop, like the Rising Sun on the Arizona Memorial. It's how lib-uh-rhuls would have done it then if they could have...
A change of architects would be a good start.
"Not good enough. We don't WANT to "keep the spirit of the design." "
PING!
Why don't they just preserve the makeshift memorial that ordinary folks built there in the days, weeks and months following 9/11? That was a real "people's monument".
But that's still very interesting. Who noted, on 9/11 and the subsequent furor, that Flight 93's bearing was straight towards Mecca???
No one that I know of. Was it?
If the missing piece of the circle is supposed to indicate the bearing of the plane, then it was, wasn't it?
A circle would be good.
I heard the same architect wanted to put a Nazi swastika monument at Dachau as a "sign of reconciliation."
If that jerk wants to build a crescent then let him go live in Iran.
Look who is handling approval and fundraising for the memorial...
http://www.sunherald.com/mld/sunherald/news/politics/12584888.htm
"Flight 93 was the first battle won in the war on terrorism. ... It is now part of the fabric of our nation," said Joanne Hanley of the National Park Service, which will manage the memorial.
Hanley, superintendent of four Park Service sites in western Pennsylvania, and Interior Secretary Gale Norton must approve the design.
Attending the announcement ceremony was Tom Ridge, the former Pennsylvania governor and secretary of Homeland Security, who, with retired Gen. Tommy Franks, is leading the campaign to raise $30 million for the memorial. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania has donated about $10 million.
"I think the design itself is very simple and elegant. I love the power," Ridge said of what he called "a very sacred and very special place."
Asked whether he thought fundraising would be difficult, he said, "Americans respond with enormous generosity at times like this, whether it's to help hurricane victims or to memorialize this very special group of Americans who gave their lives."
So design and arc shaped memorial and call it the Arc of Remembrance.
Here you go!
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