Monuments in America

The founders here identify an crucial element of a monument; it transcends the petty concerns of politics and faith to focus on eternal truths, deep human motivations, or accomplishments that stand for all time. This monument also shares a singularity that is evident at the Los Angeles National Cemetery; it attempts to list the label of all those who are buried there. This must be a basic criterion for any monument that aspires to memorialize a group of passel, and although it is inevitable that some names will be missing, the intent to include everyone should be there, and every attempt should be made to identify those names.

One of the most powerful and woful monuments of our time is a museum. It is a museum that I have not yet had the privilege of visiting but one which I decided long ago that I would visit someday; it has become part of my destiny and my future, sight unseen. This museum, founded by Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, pre services the historic memory of the Holocaust for other survivors and for those of us, non-Jews like me and Jews like those in modern-day America, who have been goddam to live a life without such abominations. For the survivors, the museum captures the arresting horror of the death camps with actual artifacts salvaged from the sites, among them an actual barracks from Auschwitz and a rail car. These artifacts serve two important purposes for those people(they vindicat

e their testimony to prove that what the people reported actually happened, and they quicken what for some is a long-overdue grief process. The WAAC Newsletter states in its denomination "The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: Preserving History Against All betting odds" that

4. Emmons, David. Online Dimensions: A Journal of Holocaust Studies. 16 (2002):1. Retrieved on April 9, 2005. from hypertext transfer protocol://www.adl.org/education/dimensions_16/default.asp

The Holocaust made an indelible scar on the psyche of humanity, and this museum has successfully memorialized that wound for all time.

In summing up his reason for building the museum, Elie Wiesel reminded us all of the purpose and lever of a true monument: "For the dead and the living we must bear witness...." In his excellent article on watching and commemoration in Online Dimensions: A Journal of Holocaust Studies, David Emmons draws a parallel between September 11th and the Holocaust and exposit the expressions of grief and the outpouring of public sentiment that ensued. He notes that people left personal memorials to the victims at the World Trade sum total site. People took photographs of the site. Huge "grief walls" were created, where people made collages and wrote messages such as "Hate only creates hate" on lusus naturae pieces of canvas (4). All of these things might be considered types of monuments in their throw right, yet not of the caliber of the Holocaust Museum. The difference is a difference between personal reactions and expressions of grief, therapeutic though they may be, and timeless, universal monuments that express the heart of a people as a whole. Emotion alone is not enough to ground a veritable monument, although the monument must certainly lift deep emotion. The monument must be historic, must stand for the grief of all survivors, and must memorialize all who were lost. It
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