Landmark for Peace Memorial

Last updated
Landmark for Peace Memorial
Landmark for Peace Memorial (fair use).jpg
ArtistGreg Perry and Daniel Edwards
Year1994 (1994)
Type bronze and Cor-Ten steel
LocationMartin Luther King Jr. Park
1702 N. Broadway St.
Indianapolis, Indiana, United States
Coordinates 39°47′27″N86°08′47″W / 39.79077°N 86.14637°W / 39.79077; -86.14637
OwnerIndianapolis Parks and Recreation Department

The Landmark for Peace is a memorial sculpture in Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Park on the northside of Indianapolis. It honors the contributions of the slain leaders Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. The memorial, which features Kennedy and King reaching out to each other, was designed and executed by Indiana artist Greg Perry. The bronze portraits were created by Indianapolis sculptor Daniel Edwards.

Contents

On April 4, 2018, the memorial was designated as the Kennedy-King National Commemorative Site.

Background

On April 4, 1968, Robert Kennedy flew to Indianapolis for a planned, inner-city rally promoting his presidential campaign, and was informed upon landing about King's assassination. Kennedy was told that riots had broken out in other cities and was advised not to make the speech, but he proceeded to address the gathered crowd at 17th and Broadway, near the site where the memorial now stands. Instead of a campaign stump speech, he delivered a five-minute improvised statement informing the crowd of King's death and urging racial reconciliation. [1] No riots took place in Indianapolis, a fact many attribute to the effect of Kennedy's speech. [2] [3] [4]

History

The idea to create the Landmark for Peace was originally suggested by Indiana Democratic politician, Larry Allyn Conrad. Before his death Conrad befriended Steve Mannheimer, an Indianapolis Star art critic and Herron School of Art professor. They once spoke at length about the need to commemorate the events of April 4, 1968, and Robert Kennedy's speech to a crowd gathered near the corner of 17th and Broadway streets in Indianapolis. [5] At the time Conrad was an executive with the Simon Property Group, the Indianapolis-based shopping mall developers, and a close friend of Herbert A. Simon and his wife Diane, who had been a worker in Kennedy's campaign at the time of his speech. Conrad suggested that should a memorial be created, the Simon family would offer its support.

In 1994 Donnie Walsh, president and CEO of the Indiana Pacers, owned by the Simon brothers, decided to start the Pacers Foundation to empower young people and support community partnerships addressing equity in safety, education, and health. [6] Walsh discussed his plans with Mannheimer, who recounted to Walsh the earlier conversation with Conrad. Walsh immediately seized on the idea of a memorial as an ideal project to launch the Foundation and asked Mannheimer to work with Pacers executive Kathryn Jordan on the project. Together Mannheimer and Jordan developed a plan to hold a national design competition to create a memorial to Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy. The design competition was funded by the Pacers Foundation. [7]

Jurors for the competition included Bret Waller, director of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, and Harry Robinson, professor of architecture at Howard University. From a national field of over 50 entries, the jury selected the proposal by designer Greg Perry, a 33-year-old artist from Franklin, Indiana. [8] Perry's design featured two half-figures—one of King, the other of Kennedy—emerging from solid walls flanking a pathway to reach toward each other. It was an inspired design that captured the historical importance of these two great Americans and powerfully expressed the spirit of reconciliation and the striving for peace people still found in the story of their lives—and deaths. Before the actual construction of the memorial began, a ceremonial groundbreaking was held on May 14, 1994. This event attracted President Bill Clinton, Senator Ted Kennedy, RFK's widow Ethel Kennedy, two sons of King, Dexter Scott King and Martin Luther King III, as well as other Indiana and national dignitaries. [9]

As the memorial construction got underway, the jury suggested modifications to make Perry's original design more open and inviting. These included shortening and some physical piercing of the walls to allow greater visual penetration of the entire structure. Perry worked with Mannheimer and Daniel Edwards, who sculpted and oversaw casting of the figures of King and Kennedy, to fine-tune the design. To relieve the monolithic solidity of the steel walls, the three conceived the idea of openings contoured to suggest shadows cast by the half-figures. After several attempts to shine bright lights on the half-figures to create actual shadows, Mannheimer drew the desired contours in chalk on the steel walls, which were laser cut and smoothed to create the cut-outs. The total cost of creating and installing the memorial, including two markers with bronze plaques, approached $200,000. One of the plaques contains the text of Kennedy's speech, parts of which were later inscribed on his own memorial at Arlington National Cemetery after the senator's assassination later that year. A marker near the actual spot from which Kennedy spoke contains remnants of guns confiscated by the Indianapolis police or collected as part of a city amnesty program created in conjunction with the Indiana Pacers. The contest required the confiscated weapons to be used in the memorial's design. [10]

The City of Indianapolis contributed significantly to the project by completely redesigning the southern half of King Memorial Park where the sculpture would stand. This effort amounted to a $350,000 addition to the total project and was overseen by the Indianapolis Parks and Recreation Department and its landscape architecture staff. The unveiling of the Landmark for Peace memorial on September 30, 1995, attracted nearly 3,000 people. [11]

On April 4, 2018, exactly fifty years after King's assassination and Kennedy's speech, President Donald Trump signed into law the Kennedy-King National Commemorative Site Act designating the Landmark for Peace Memorial as the Kennedy-King National Commemorative Site. [12]

Expansion

In April 2009, a $3 million expansion was planned for the memorial. Components of this expansion would include an eternal flame incorporated into the site, an amphitheater to seat 75 to 200 people, and twin elliptical walkways along a wall that abruptly end to symbolize the sudden end of the lives of King and Kennedy. [13]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Luther King Jr.</span> American Baptist minister and civil rights leader (1929–1968)

Martin Luther King Jr. was an American Christian minister, activist, and political philosopher who was one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. A Black church leader and a son of early civil rights activist and minister Martin Luther King Sr., King advanced civil rights for people of color in the United States through the use of nonviolent resistance and nonviolent civil disobedience against Jim Crow laws and other forms of discrimination in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Coretta Scott King</span> American civil rights leader; wife of Martin Luther King, Jr. (1927–2006)

Coretta Scott King was an American author, activist, and civil rights leader and the wife of Martin Luther King Jr. from 1953 until his death. As an advocate for African-American equality, she was a leader for the civil rights movement in the 1960s. King was also a singer who often incorporated music into her civil rights work. King met her husband while attending graduate school in Boston. They both became increasingly active in the American civil rights movement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park</span> National Historical Park of the United States

The Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park covers about 35 acres (0.14 km2) and includes several sites in Atlanta, Georgia related to the life and work of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. Within the park is his boyhood home, and Ebenezer Baptist Church — the church where King was baptized and both he and his father, Martin Luther King Sr., were pastors — as well as, the grave site of King, Jr., and his wife, civil rights activist Coretta Scott King.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial</span> Memorial in Washington, D.C.

The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial is a national memorial located in West Potomac Park next to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It covers four acres (1.6 ha) and includes the Stone of Hope, a granite statue of Civil Rights Movement leader Martin Luther King Jr. carved by sculptor Lei Yixin. The inspiration for the memorial design is a line from King's "I Have a Dream" speech: "Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope." The memorial opened to the public on August 22, 2011, after more than two decades of planning, fund-raising, and construction.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Golden Hill Historic District (Indianapolis, Indiana)</span> Historic district in Indiana, United States

Golden Hill is an affluent and historic neighborhood overlooking the White River on the west side of Indianapolis's Center Township, in Marion County, Indiana. The district is bounded on the east by Clifton Street, which is west of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard ; on the west by the White River and the Central Canal; on the south by Thirty-sixth Street; and on the north by Woodstock Country Club, immediately south of Thirty-eighth Street. Golden Hill is noted for its collection of homes designed by several of the city's prominent architects. The estate homes reflect several styles of period revival architecture. The district is known as for its community planning and remains an exclusive enclave for the city's prominent families. Golden Hill was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1991.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">King Center for Nonviolent Social Change</span> Not-for-profit organization in Atlanta, Georgia, United States

The Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, commonly known as The King Center, is a nongovernmental, not-for-profit organization in Atlanta, United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indiana World War Memorial Plaza</span> Historic district in Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S.

The Indiana World War Memorial Plaza is an urban feature and war memorial located in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana, United States, originally built to honor the veterans of World War I. It was conceived in 1919 as a location for the national headquarters of the American Legion and a memorial to the state's and nation's veterans.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert F. Kennedy's speech on the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.</span> 1968 speech by U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy

On April 4, 1968, United States Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York delivered an improvised speech several hours after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Kennedy, who was campaigning to earn the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, made his remarks while in Indianapolis, Indiana, after speaking at two Indiana universities earlier in the day. Before boarding a plane to attend campaign rallies in Indianapolis, he learned that King had been shot in Memphis, Tennessee. Upon arrival, Kennedy was informed that King had died. His own brother, John Fitzgerald Kennedy had been assassinated on November 22, 1963. Robert F. Kennedy would be also assassinated two months after this speech, while campaigning for presidential nomination at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">I Have a Dream</span> 1963 speech delivered by Martin Luther King Jr.

"I Have a Dream" is a public speech that was delivered by American civil rights activist and Baptist minister Martin Luther King Jr. during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963. In the speech, King called for civil and economic rights and an end to racism in the United States. Delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the speech was one of the most famous moments of the civil rights movement and among the most iconic speeches in American history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Irving Gymnasium</span> Former athletics facility in Muncie, Indiana, U.S.

Irving Gymnasium was an indoor athletics facility on the campus of Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, USA. Opened in 1962 with a capacity of 6,600 spectators, it hosted primarily Ball State Cardinals basketball and volleyball games until Worthen Arena opened in 1992. It hosted the 1972 and 1976 NCAA Men's Volleyball Championship games.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert F. Kennedy</span> American politician and lawyer (1925–1968)

Robert Francis Kennedy, also known by his initials RFK and by the nickname Bobby, was an American politician and lawyer. He served as the 64th United States attorney general from January 1961 to September 1964, and as a U.S. senator from New York from January 1965 until his assassination in June 1968, when he was running for the Democratic presidential nomination. Like his brothers John F. Kennedy and Ted Kennedy, he was a prominent member of the Democratic Party and is an icon of modern American liberalism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.</span> 1968 murder in Memphis, Tennessee, U.S.

Martin Luther King Jr., an African-American clergyman and civil rights movement leader, was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968, at 6:01 p.m. CST. He was rushed to St. Joseph's Hospital, where he died at 7:05 p.m. He was a prominent leader of the civil rights movement and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who was known for his use of nonviolence and civil disobedience.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">On the Mindless Menace of Violence</span> 1968 speech by U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy

"On the Mindless Menace of Violence" is a speech given by United States Senator and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy. He delivered it in front of the City Club of Cleveland at the Sheraton-Cleveland Hotel on April 5, 1968, the day after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. With the speech, Kennedy sought to counter the King-related riots and disorder emerging in various cities, and address what he viewed as the growing problem of violence in American society.

Robert F. Kennedy's speech at Ball State University was given on April 4, 1968, in Muncie, Indiana.

The history of the 1954 to 1968 American civil rights movement has been depicted and documented in film, song, theater, television, and the visual arts. These presentations add to and maintain cultural awareness and understanding of the goals, tactics, and accomplishments of the people who organized and participated in this nonviolent movement.

Robert F. Kennedy, the 64th United States Attorney General, a U.S. senator from New York, and the brother of United States president John F. Kennedy, has frequently been depicted or referenced in works of popular culture.

<i>Behold</i> (statue)

Behold is a statue designed by sculptor Patrick Morelli. Dedicated in 1990 by Coretta Scott King, the statue is located in front of Ebenezer Baptist Church, in the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park.

There are two statues of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in Newark, New Jersey. Both are located on the Essex County Courthouse Complex at its newest addition, the Martin Luther King Justice Building.

References

  1. ↑ "Symbol of peace unveiled", South Bend Tribune, October 1, 1995.
  2. ↑ "Dr. Martin Luther King Jr Park". Archived from the original on 2010-05-30. Retrieved 2010-01-04.
  3. ↑ "How RFK Built Indianapolis a "Landmark for Peace" in Six Minutes" . Retrieved September 10, 2016.[ dead link ]
  4. ↑ Glory-June Greiff, Remembrance, Faith, and Fancy: Outdoor Public Sculpture in Indiana (Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society Press, 2005), 28.
  5. ↑ TheStatehouseFile.com, Xain Ballenger (2023-01-16). "City to invest in spot where Robert Kennedy broke news of Martin Luther King's assassination". The Statehouse File. Retrieved 2024-01-17.
  6. ↑ "Our Purpose". Pacers Foundation. Retrieved 2024-01-17.
  7. ↑ "Kennedy-King National Commemorative Site". indyencyclopedia.org. 2021-04-26. Retrieved 2024-01-17.
  8. ↑ Diane Penner, The Indianapolis Star, January 15, 1995.
  9. ↑ Clinton, Bill (May 14, 1994). "Remarks at the groundbreaking ceremony for the landmark for peace memorial in Indianapolis, Indiana" (PDF). U.S. Government Printing Office. Retrieved March 16, 2013.
  10. ↑ Mary Beth Schnieder, "President Clinton's visit commemorates the night blacks, whites come together to rise above the potential violence", The Indianapolis Star, May 14, 1994.
  11. ↑ Marcella Fleming, "'It Refreshes My Soul'", The Indianapolis Star, October 1, 1995.
  12. ↑ "President Donald J. Trump Signs H.R. 4851 into Law". whitehouse.gov . April 4, 2018. Retrieved April 7, 2018– via National Archives.
  13. ↑ Diana Penner, "Building on a Dream", The Indianapolis Star, March 30, 2009.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.