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Dorothy Copus Brush Our kids are keeping the spirit alive We have so many kids doing good things in
our country. One nationwide project is held in schools
every year at this time. Students collect canned food to pass
on to area food banks. That is a worthy effort, but there is
more because once the collection ends, the creativity begins. In Chattanooga they call it "Canstruction,"
because all those cans are used to build works of art. To enhance
the learning experience local architectural firms are paired
with schools to advise the students in their project. At the Chattanooga Visitor's Center, a map
of downtown Chattanooga was fashioned with cans. The theme was
"A CANdid tour of Downtown," and when it was completed
the map was given the name "The incredible, edible map of
Chattanooga." Another school built a giant nutcracker using
cans and it was displayed at the Imax 3D Theater. At the Hunter
Museum, another team of students created a 6-foot-high and 10-foot-long
American flag with their cans. Annually, an International Junior Civitan
competition is held to collect food and then create a design
and build structures from the cans based on a common theme. This
year, the theme was "United We Can." Columbia Academy,
a private school of 340 students, used their 84,325 cans to fashion
a patriotic scene. The Statue of Liberty sculpture was dominant,
surrounded by a huge American flag. All these impressive scenes
are displayed for a short time and then torn down so the food
can be distributed by food banks. Unlike the can project which covers a short
span of time, the "Paper Clip Project" undertaken in
Whitwell, TN, by the middle school there covered many months.
It all started when two teachers were preparing lesson plans
on World War II. As they discussed the Holocaust, they looked
for a way to help their pupils comprehend the number 6 million,
the number of lives sacrificed in the Holocaust. They decided
on a unique method. Students would be asked to collect 6 million
paper clips, one for each Jew that perished. The "Paper Clip Project" was a fine
human interest story and was picked up by many news sources.
As the story spread, paper clips began arriving in Whitwell from
across the country. Even after the 6 million number was reached,
the paper clip collection continued to grow. It swelled to over
28 million. The focus on 6 million expanded to include everyone
who was affected by the Nazi's evil genocide attempts. The project did not go unnoticed by Holocaust
survivors. Four of those traveled from New York to visit Whitwell
to relate their personal stories to the students. The visit was
an unforgettable educational experience for the youngsters, and
for those elderly survivors, it was uplifting to know they had
not been forgotten. But there was even more to come. A German
couple, Dagmar and Peter Schroeder, both professional journalists,
saw the story on the Internet and were so moved they added another
chapter to the project. They went in search of one of the "cattle
cars" that had been used to transport victims to the concentration
camps. Five weeks and 3,000 miles later, they found one in a
small museum and they paid $6,000 for it. They persuaded the German military to transport
it to a German port where it was shipped to Baltimore. There
CSX Transportation Inc. took over and donated their services
to take the car to its final destination in Whitwell. Once there,
a Chattanooga crane company and a Dunlap firm donated their expertise
to get the car in place on tracks in front of Whitwell Middle
School. Last month at the dedication ceremony, the
Schroeders were there and told a poignant story. A 76-year-old
survivor had planned to kill herself on Nov. 9, the 63rd anniversary
of the "Night of Broken Glass." Her entire family had
been shipped to concentration camps on that night, but she happened
to see the story of the "Paper Clip Project" and she
changed her mind. Visitors to the Children's Holocaust Memorial
see a glass display case inside the car which holds 11 million
paper clips of all sizes and colors as a memorial to all victims
of the Holocaust. We have so many kids doing good things in our country. · · · |