Caching & Sightseeing in Downtown OKC 5/27/2010

This morning we left Muffy and Raggs at the coach and drove into OKC to do a few caches and do some sightseeing. Our first stop was for 2 virtual caches at the OKC National Memorial. The first stop was at a statue across from the Memorial at a statue call "And jesus Wept". On a corner adjacent to the memorial is a sculpture of Jesus weeping erected by St. Joseph's Catholic Church. St. Joseph's, one of the first brick and mortar churches in the city, was almost completely destroyed by the blast. The statue is not part of the memorial itself but is popular with visitors nonetheless.

The next stop was across the street at the OKC Bombing National Memorial. AWESOME, AWESOME, AWESOME is all we can say about this site. This was the most beautiful and truly touching site that we have visited in our 2 1/2 years of traveling. The Oklahoma City National Memorial is a memorial in the United States that honors the victims, survivors, rescuers, and all who were changed 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.
The National Memorial was established on October 9, 1997, through the signing of the Oklahoma City National Memorial Act of 1997, by President Bill Clinton, and, as with all National Park Service historic areas, was administratively listed on the National Register of Historic Places the same day. The memorial is administered by Oklahoma City National Memorial Foundation, with the National Park Service maintaining a presence at the memorial for interpretation purposes. The National Memorial Museum and the Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism are the two components which are housed in the old 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 the following year on February 19.
The Outdoor Symbolic Memorial consists of the following segments on 3.3 acres, and can be visited 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

The Gates of Time: Monumental twin bronze 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:

We come here to remember Those who were killed, those who survived and those changed forever. May all who leave here know the impact of violence. May this memorial offer comfort, strength, peace, hope and serenity.

Reflecting Pool: A thin layer of water flowing over polished black granite, the Reflecting Pool runs east to west down the center of the Memorial (also see reflecting pool) on what was once Fifth Street. Visitors who see their reflection in the reflecting pool are supposed to see "a face of a person changed by domestic terrorism."

Field of Empty Chairs: 168 empty chairs hand-crafted from glass, bronze, and stone represent those who lost their lives in the tragedy. A bombing victim's name is etched in the glass base of each chair. The chairs represent the empty chairs at the dinner tables of the victims' families. The chairs are arranged in nine rows symbolizing the nine floors of the building, and each person's chair is on the row (or the floor) on which the person worked or was visiting 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 when the bomb went off (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 800 survivors from the building and the surrounding area, many of whom were injured in the blast.

The Survivor Tree: An American elm on the north side of the Memorial, this tree was the only shade tree in the parking lot across the street from the Murrah Building, and commuters came in to work early to get one of the shady parking spots provided by its branches. Photos of Oklahoma City taken around the time of statehood (1907) show this tree, meaning it is currently at least 103 years old. Despite its age, the tree was neglected and taken for granted prior to the blast. Heavily damaged by the bomb, the Tree ultimately survived after nearly being chopped down during the initial investigation, in order 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 of the tree. Most thought the tree could not survive. However, almost a year after the bombing, family members, survivors and rescue workers gathered for a memorial ceremony under the tree noticed it was beginning to bloom again. The Survivor Tree now thrives, in no small part because the specifications for the Outdoor Memorial design included a mandate to feature and protect the Tree. One example of the dramatic measures taken to save the Tree: 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. A second example is the decking around the Tree, which is 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:

The spirit of this city and this nation will not be defeated; our deeply rooted faith sustains us.
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 today in public and private places all over the United States; saplings were sent to Columbine High School after the massacre there, to New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani after the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007, and various other times.

The Memorial Fence: A ten foot tall chain link fence was originally 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 and became famous itself, with visitors leaving stuffed animals, poems, keychains, and other items there as tributes. During the construction of the Outdoor Memorial, 210 feet 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, catalogued, and stored.

Rescuers' Orchard: A grove of Oklahoma redbuds (Oklahoma's state tree), Amur Maple, Chinese Pistache, 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. The tiles are now stored in the Memorial's Archives, and a sampling of those tiles is on the wall in the Children's Area, along with a series of chalkboards 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.

Journal Record Building: North of the memorial is the former Journal Record Building which now houses the Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum, which features numerous exhibits and artifacts related to the Oklahoma City Bombing. Also in the building is the National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, a non-partisan think tank created shortly after the bombing by family members and survivors 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. The plaza was an original part of the federal building, and contained garden and seating areas, as well as the second floor daycare's playground. Visitors to the Memorial may still access the plaza, and the flagpole from which flies the American flag is the original flagpole that was in place on April 19, 1995.

It was quite a feeling walking around here, seeing and remembering this awful disaster. Myself I think the Field of Empty Chairs was the most touching knowing that for each chair there was a person who was killed that day.

After leaving here we drove around the downtown area taking pictures and seeing the sights. We did do a couple of traditional caches one of them was a corral of buffaloes from the Spirit of the Buffaloes Project that I posted the pictures of last night. The Spirit of the Buffalo project was designed as a fund-raiser forthe Local Chapter of the Nature Conservancy. The project was the"brainchild" of our dear friend, Keven Virgilio. Keven's fondest wish for the Spirit of the Buffalo was that the project would live on past the fundraising portion. Luckily for us, it has. Sadly, our friend, Keven did not. She lost her battle with pancreatic cancer in July of 2005. We also did a cache at a McDonalds.

Then we drove to Bricktown the historic section of OKC. For more than a century, the Land Run of 1889 has inspired artists and writers drawn to the universal themes of adventure, hope, and diversity. Today, MAPS projects such as the ballpark and festive river walk offer new inspiration for the creative spirit.
The area affected by the current public art proposal is bounded roughly by the Santa Fe tracks on the west, Walnut Avenue on the east, Second Street on the north, and the North Canadian River on the south. It is an area of town rich in history just as it is rich in opportunity - a crossroads of history where time and place converge to help us understand ourselves, our community, and our future.
Underlying all else is the fact that the Bricktown area is the historic crossroads of commerce in Oklahoma City.
Like the heart in the human body, the railroad was the engine that provided the lifeblood of early economic development. From 1889 to 1904, four railroad companies laid ribbons of steel that connected the land-locked prairie community to the rest of the world. First was the Santa Fe that built north and south almost two years before the land run. Then came the Rock Island, the Frisco, and the Katy.
Each of these railroad companies focused their freight operations east of the Santa Fe tracks in what is now Bricktown. Outbound over those docks passed the wealth of the new territory. The most important cash crop by far was cotton, shipped to world markets over the steel rails to Galveston and points beyond. Other commodities putting dollars in farmers' pockets included cattle, horses, mules, as well as wheat, fruit, corn, and produce. After 1928 and the discovery of the Oklahoma City Field, oil was added to the list of exports.
Inbound over the rails of commerce came manufactured goods such as machinery, hardware, farm implements, and automobiles, especially after 1915 when Henry Ford opened his assembly plant in Oklahoma City. With money in their pockets, consumers across the state demanded new products ranging from radios to Sears' ready-to-assemble homes. Each new shipment crossed the loading docks in Bricktown. On top of all this was the flow of passenger traffic, carrying residents to and from home and traveling salesmen to and from nearby hotels such as the Huckins and Skirvin.
To handle this ebb and flow of commerce, three generations of unique brick buildings were constructed east of the Santa Fe tracks in Bricktown.
The first structures appeared between 1898 and 1903, such as the Sherman Ironworks Foundry, that were typically one or two stories tall with arched windows and embellished door ways. The next generation, constructed between 1903 and 1911, were usually multi-storied with less ornamentation and fewer arches. The third wave of construction, from 1911 to 1930, was marked by even taller buildings with rows of rectangular windows and large graphics signs. The common thread holding all together was the use of red brick.
While the engine of economic growth gained momentum, another chapter of Oklahoma City history was unfolding in the same part of town. That was the story of the African-American community.
From 1889 to the 1930s Bricktown was a battleground for social justice and the birthplace of cultural diversity in Oklahoma City.
It began when some of the first 200 African-Americans attracted by the land run settled in Sandtown, located along the north bank of the river east of the Santa Fe tracks. From there, the black community grew northward as jobs were created and new waves of immigrants arrived looking for a piece of the promised land. By 1910 there were more than 7,000 black people in Oklahoma City, most living on the near east side.
Despite racism and Jim Crow laws passed by the first State Legislature to separate the races in public places, the black community prospered alongside their white neighbors during the prolonged era of economic expansion. With growing families and newfound buying power, African-Americans built houses on vacant lots east along the north bank of the river or purchased older housing stock along the tracks on the north side of Bricktown. By 1915 the all-black residential community ringed the commercial district of brick buildings and stretched from the river on the south to First Street on the north and as far east as the 1000 block on Third Street.
Faced with this expansion of black families into formerly white neighborhoods, the Oklahoma City Council passed a segregation ordinance that would in effect prevent blacks from buying or moving into houses north of Second Street. Even after the United States Supreme Court declared that ordinance unconstitutional in 1916, de facto segregation kept the wall intact, making Second Street a symbolic battleline in the fight against racial injustice.
In 1915 a loud voice was raised in this battle when Roscoe Dunjee founded the first black newspaper in Oklahoma City, the "Black Dispatch." From his offices in Bricktown at 228 E. First, Dunjee and his allies organized the first local branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, challenged legal barriers in the courts, and attacked the "Bloody Fangs of Jim Crow" in the halls of power. The efforts bore fruit, first with cracks in the wall, then with a growing volume of victories however small. Year after year, under constant attack, the walls of segregation would crumble, a fight started in the neighborhoods of Bricktown.
Even after the walls of housing segregation began falling, the Bricktown area remained a crossroads for the free expression of diversity in Oklahoma. Along the northern border grew Deep Deuce, the commercial district of the black community where businessmen and women offered a wide variety of goods and services ranging from picture shows to some of the region's most prominent blues and jazz clubs. Also prospering in this crossroads of diversity was a new generation of churches, such as Calvary Baptist, which rose to praise God and provide a strong framework for the moral life of Oklahoma City.
At the heart of these cultural crossroads was Douglass High School. Founded in 1891, the all-black school moved to a two-story frame building in the 400 block of East California in 1899, followed by a move into the old Webster School in 1903. From this new home at the northwest corner of California and Walnut (where the baseball park is located today), Douglass High School became one of the leading educational institutions in the region.
Among the outstanding list of leaders at the institution were Dr. Inman Page, who first gained distinction as president of Langston University, J. A. Brazelton, founder of the Oklahoma Association of Negro Teachers, and Dr. Frederick Moon, a nationally prominent educator and civil rights advocate from the l930s to the 1960s. Sharing the stage of leadership was Mrs. Zelia Breaux, who nurtured the musical careers of young people including Charlie Christian, called the "world's greatest jazz guitarist," and Mr. Five by Five, Jimmy Rushing, called the "world's greatest blues singer." Douglass High remained in the Bricktown Building until 1934 when it moved farther east and north.
The move of Douglass High School from the neighborhood served as a symbolic transition for the Bricktown area that would span five decades of decline. First, the Great Depression brought a sudden halt to new construction and delayed needed repairs to older buildings. Then came World War II and the investment of new resources in the war effort, followed by post-war suburban sprawl and the development of new industrial parks away from the old commercial centers and closer to cheap land and the growing trucking industry. By 1980 the crossroads of commerce and cultural diversity had become a graveyard of abandoned and under utilized buildings.
Fortunately, history proves that adversity oftentimes creates new opportunities, and Bricktown was ripe for a new beginning. The raw materials were there - cheap buildings, vacant lots for parking, tax credits for restoration projects, and a consumer society that was looking for something new, something more distinctive than bland suburban shopping malls and faceless movie theaters. The only thing missing was vision, leadership, and a plan to make Bricktown the crossroads of renewal.
Efforts at urban revitalization in the 1960s and 1970s largely ignored the area while commercial developers tended to stick with more cautious projects. One man who bucked that trend was Neal Horton, a developer who saw new opportunities for the historic area. He created a plan, attracted partners, and coined the name "Bricktown" to give the old commercial district an identity. Unfortunately, the oil and banking crash of 1982 kept Horton from realizing his dreams.
Like good soldiers on the battlefield, others picked up the flag and charged on. Investors such as Jim Brewer saw bargains and were willing to invest their time and energy. Companies such as Spaghetti Warehouse moved in and pointed the way to others. And then Mayor Ron Norick and an army of leaders hatched the MAPS program that would add new attractions to Bricktown and tie it all together with a festive canal and riverwalk. Like the mythical Phoenix, the old commercial and cultural crossroads would cast off its troubled past and emerge once again as a vital part of Oklahoma City's life.
Among the restaurants and attractions that we saw in Bricktown were:Abuelo's, Biting Sow, Bourbon Street Cafe, Bricktown Brewery, Bricktown Burgers, Coach's Restaurant, In The Raw, Mickey Mantle's Restaurant, Pearl's Crabtown, Stumpy's Burger House, The Melting Pot, Tapwerks Ale House & Cafe, Toby Keith's I love This Bar & Grille, Wormy Dog Saloon, Bass Pro Shop, Civic Center, Cox Convention Center, Ford Center, OKC Redogs, Yard Dawgz, Blazers & Thunder, and the Water Taxi.

We also stopped at the AT&T Bricktown Baseball Park to walk around and see the statues. It is located on 1 Mickey Mantle Drive also. AT&T Bricktown Ballpark opened in 1998 in downtown Oklahoma City's Bricktown district. It is the home of the Oklahoma City RedHawks, the AAA affiliate of the Texas Rangers major league baseball team. The park seats 13,066 fans.
The stadium, which opened as Southwestern Bell Bricktown Ballpark (then later SBC Bricktown Ballpark) was renamed following the merger between SBC and Old AT&T in January 2006. The stadium replaced All Sports Stadium.
The stadium frequently hosts the Big 12 Baseball Tournament. The first Big 12 tournament was held at All Sports Stadium in 1997 before moving to Bricktown in 1998. The tournament has been held at Bricktown ever year since, except for 2002 and 2004, when it was contested at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, the home park of the Texas Rangers. It is also home to two games of The Bedlam Series where, the Oklahoma Sooners face the Oklahoma State Cowboys.
There was a a statue of Johnny Bench on one side of the stadium and several small statues of Wilbur Joe Rogan, Lloyd James Waner, Paul Glee Waner, Carl Owen Hubbell, John L.R. "Pepper" Martin, Bobby Murcer and Allie Pierce Reynolds along the sidewalk leading to the main entrance. At the main entrance was a huge state of #7 Mickey Mantle along with several engravings on the sides of the statue and small cemet squares on the ground all signed by his former teammates along with their hand prints. Across the street from the stadium was Mickey Mantle's Steakhouse an up scale restaurant with 4 floors.

After we were done there we headed back to the coach and stopped at the smallest working library in OKC for a nano cache. Well that's about all for today so until tomorrow we love and miss you all. Mom & Dad Dori & Dick