Children’s Peace Park Blooms

Celebrates Children and Young People — Past, Present, and Future

• DOUG GARNAR –
  

Millions of children have been murdered in wars, genocide, domestic violence, and being in the wrong place at the wrong time. On May 8, 2021, Broome County Veterans for Peace and Peace Action celebrated the dedication of a children’s peace park in Ostingingo Park, adjacent to the children’s playground. Otsiningo Park is a county park in Broome County, and prior to the pandemic a million people would visit it annually. For the past five years I have ridden my bike each year in the park. I have thought about an appropriate memorial to murdered children. My interest in this issue dates back to 1959 when, during an advanced elementary algebra course, I sat in the back of the room reading Eugene Kogan’s book, The Theory and Practice of Hell (an early Holocaust survivor’s memoir). Thus, began a sixty-year journey into war/peace issues as well the so-called collateral damage—the death of innocent children and civilians.

“Don’t be deluded. Hitler has made it clear that he will annihilate all Jews before the clock strikes twelve.”…

“I have more faith in Hitler than in anyone else. He alone has kept his promises, all his promises, to the Jewish people.”

                                          Elie Wiesel, Night

Graveyards are interesting places to visit and much can be learned from tombstones—epitaphs can be viewed as the dead speaking to the living, but only in very short pithy sentiments. How does one try to remember the countless lives of children never lived out? As a step toward ensuring that these children will not be forgotten, the Broome County Veterans for Peace and Peace Action organizations and myself approached the Broome County Parks Commissioner about creating a children’s peace garden adjacent to the children’s playground. The idea was embraced by Liz Woidt, Parks Commissioner, and we began to lay out a garden in October 2019.  The pandemic slowed us, but the outline of the garden was completed early this spring. 

The central premise of the garden is that it be a living garden which celebrates children and young people—past, present and future. We hope that it can always be a work in progress, both in terms of flowers, grasses, herbs, trees as well as activities which celebrate the possibilities of a world beyond war. A major feature of the garden is a small schoolhouse lending library containing children’s books.  They can be read there or taken home. People are encouraged to bring books and we have had 15 boxes donated to date.

The May 8th Dedication Ceremony was an expression of the creativity we believe the garden can encourage on its best days, as evidenced by the following activities.

• The unveiling of the Children’s Peace Park monument by the Glee dance group.

• Music selections performed by Andru Beemis playing several of his stringed instruments.

• There were several inspirational dance routines by young women performers.

• Rose Garrity spoke eloquently about the problems of child/spouse abuse which are too rarely talked about.

• Judy McMahon dressed in appropriate garb to read Julia Ward Howe’s “Mother’s Day Proclamation.”

• Cayden and Emma Cacala sang a beautiful duet, “The Best Day.”

• A poem was read by Abagayle Bennett which included these opening verses:

“There are stories with unwritten pages.
Conclusions to life that should have continued.   
Moments that should have been experienced.
Love that should have been felt.
Some children are taken from their storyline, far before the end.
Ripped from the rough pages of the biography of their lives.
With each moment we experience, we should do our best to remember that it is a moment stolen from another.
We can not erase the past, we can simply do our best to heal the future,
And give life to the legacies of those we could not save.  
May their stories bloom with the growth of the garden,
And may their memories live on within us.”

• The dedication ended with a dance routine focusing on the theme of mothers and children. 

• Theodore Roosevelt Elementary School contributed over 50 pictures of children’s art work reflecting their vision of peace and the peace garden.

As the garden matures, we expect to have herbs for children to smell, occasional story readings and the planting of a Linden tree adjacent to the garden.  The Linden tree is a symbol of peace, compassion, love and hope.

Finally, in Binghamton there is a bridge now used only for pedestrian traffic. At one end of the bridge is the “Skirmisher,” a statue depicting a soldier who fought in the Spanish American War—a war fueled by Yellow Journalism and America’s arrival on the stage of global imperialism. On the other side of the bridge is a small number of trees planted by an Armenian refugee church to remember the first genocide of the 20th century. President Biden just recognized the slaughter of a million plus Armenians by the former Ottoman Turks as an act of genocide much to the anger of modern-day Turkey. He has also decided to bring back all American troops from Afghanistan by September 11 ending, in his words, “the longest/costliest war in American history.” Native Americans might beg to differ looking at three centuries of wars ending with the 1890 massacre of over 300 Lakota at Wounded Knee. The majority of the dead were mowed down with Hotchkiss machines guns and 20 Congressional medals were awarded to the 7th Cavalry which carried out the “action.”

“We say never again while we plant the same seed that will make it happen again” – from Bangabiki Habyarimana’, The Golden Pearl of Wisdom. Memorial peace gardens can be a small but important “Public Voice” to offer an alternative to the paradigm of war and violence. 1

Visit bcpeaceaction.org/childrens-peace-park-dedication/ for many more images.

Some of the inspiration for the Otsiningo Children’s Peace garden came from a similar Peace Garden located adjacent to the Holland Land Office in Batavia, NY. Anyone interest in such a project is welcome to contact Doug Garnar at garnardc@sunybroome