This last public “collaborative engagement” event will give people the chance to glue pieces of the colored tile into place for the permanent mosaic. It will occur at the Opportunity Center in the Dayton Metro Library downtown at 215 E. Third St., according to Kristin Deck, operations manager of The Mosaic Institute.
“The bench mosaic is a separate piece. It has a line of poetry written in it from Sierra Leone, one of the team members,” said Jes McMillan, The Mosaic Institute’s executive director. “We are asking the community to please join us to fill in around those letters and finish the bench mosaic.”
Work on the Seed of Life 8-4 Memorial has been ongoing for months, in preparation for the dedication Aug. 4, the five-year anniversary of the tragedy. The memorial is near the intersection of Fifth and Wayne, just east of The Trolley Stop.
Credit: Jim Noelker
Credit: Jim Noelker
Work on the ground mosaic, the tiles laid into the sidewalk on East Fifth, was scheduled to be finished Wednesday morning with the final grouting work, Deck said.
McMillan said more than 75 volunteers showed up Tuesday to help out. Over the past six months, more than 5,000 people have had some part in the ground mosaic, she said, as the institute has gone to three dozen locations to involve the public.
“Team Mosaic would just love to thank the spirit of Dayton — Dayton Strong,” McMillan said.
She couldn’t say precisely when the memorial would be finished.
“There are so many moving parts. There’s a sculpture that has to be lowered in place. There’s the bench that has to be finished,” McMillan said. “We will have the entire site fenced off until the opening. You can look at it, but you can’t come onto (the memorial site). … On Aug. 4, everything will be cleared, everything will be beautiful.”
On Aug. 4, 2019, Connor Betts, 24, of Bellbrook, shot and killed nine people and wounded about 20 others on the streets of the Oregon District around 1 a.m. Police responded quickly and killed Betts.
The nine who lost their lives were Lois Oglesby, Saeed Saleh, Derrick Fudge, Nicholas Cumer, Logan Turner, Thomas McNichols, Beatrice Warren-Curtis, Monica Brickhouse and Megan Betts.
The team creating the memorial includes McMillan’s Mosaic Institute, architect/sculptor Terry Welker, poet Sierra Leone and artist James Pate. Organizers say the memorial “will be an important step in the healing process as we remember those who were lost and grieve with those who were affected by this tragedy in the heart of our community.”
More details
For more information on the memorial, visit www.8-4memorial.com, or check out the Mosaic Institute on social media — MI Dayton on Instagram, and Mosaic Institute Dayton on Facebook.
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