RSSDowntown remembrance of 9/11 endures
A sculpture by Pat Olson at Seventh and Main streets in downtown Grand Junction contains a 200-pound beam from wreckage of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack in New York City. Olson, a Grand Junction sculptor, used the beam after the Downtown Development Authority requested a piece of wreckage in 2009.
Reports that more beams salvaged from the Sept. 11 wreckage may be heading toward Grand Junction are likely not true, multiple local officials said Monday.
An article in Sunday’s Denver Post said that Grand Junction was one of 15 Colorado communities that will receive pieces of the steel beams recovered from the World Trade Center towers after 9/11.
In reality, Grand Junction already has received a 200-pound piece of a beam, said Downtown Development Authority Marketing Director Kathy Dirks. No other piece from the World Trade Center is expected in Grand Junction, she said.
City spokeswoman Sam Rainguet knew of no other World Trade Center pieces en route to Grand Junction, either.
The beam Grand Junction did receive was requested by the DDA back in 2009 and was subsequently used in local sculptor Pat Olson’s “Remember” sculpture. That sculpture is on permanent display at the southwest corner of Seventh and Main streets.
The heavy mass of steel Olson used came from the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, he said.
The Port made news in Denver recently when an estimated 230,000 pounds of steel was given to the city to use in two 9/11 memorials, according to the Denver Post article.
Olson said he also submitted a request for a piece of wreckage from the Pentagon in connection with 9/11, but he has not heard whether Grand Junction will ever receive that piece.
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