Original memorial crosses brought back a year later by request

By DESMOND LAWE

The white crosses that served as an impromptu memorial site on the hill outside the Holmes Student Center last year briefly returned Friday to commemorate the one year anniversary of the shooting at Cole Hall.

Greg Zanis of Crosses for Losses said there was a great demand to bring back the crosses.

“There was a great outcry to bring them back this year, especially by the father of one of the victims,” Zanis said.

The crosses were reinstalled across the bridge from Cole Hall. A brief ceremony was held Saturday at 2:15 p.m. Zanis led a small group in the Lord’s prayer and invited audience members to participate by reading the names from the crosses.

Michelle Bastion traveled all the way from LaSalle to honor her cousin who was one of the victims of the shooting.

“I kind of felt like I needed to be here,” said Bastion. “I wish that more people had showed up, but I guess that there wasn’t a lot of publicity.”

The sparse crowd that attended the ceremony was made up of mostly non-students.

“We heard about this event in our local paper,” Bastion said. “There must not have been much press on campus.”

Last year, there were six crosses on the hill, five with the slain student’s names and one blank one. Many people believed that this cross memorialized the gunman. To try to clear up confusion, Zanis put a Columbine High School T-shirt on the blank cross. Zanis also put up crosses at Columbine after the shooting there. This year, Zanis only put in the five crosses with the students’ names.

During the ceremony, Zanis explained why.

“Last year, we had six crosses,” Zanis said. “Today, there are only five. Today is about honoring the lives lost and the families affected. We don’t want to honor him the same way.”

Zanis mentioned the controversy surrounding his sixth cross and the sixth cross a local religious organization put up and acknowledged that there was still a lot of anger.

“I mean for the crosses to heal,” Zanis said. “Any other distractions would take away from that.”

Mary Aurich, a junior marketing major in attendance, agreed with the decision.

“I think it was inappropriate to honor him alongside the victims,” Aurich said. “The crosses were a very powerful memorial, and I am happy to see just the five this year.”