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Fire victims memorialized with monument


By Shannan Bowen
Staff Writer

Published: Friday, May 16, 2008 at 7:22 p.m.
Last Modified: Friday, May 16, 2008 at 11:21 p.m.
Ocean Isle Beach | After the unveiling of a cross-shaped monument Friday afternoon in memory of the seven college students who died in an October house fire here, the mother of one victim was searching for someone.

Staff photo | Paul Stephen
Friends and family members of the victims of last year's deadly house fire at Ocean Isle Beach gather outside the town's fire department for a service unveiling a memorial cross previously located at the scene of the blaze in its new, permanent home Friday May 16, 2008.
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Kaaren Mann, whose daughter Lauren Mahon died in the Oct. 28 fire, crossed the street to catch up with a man using a walking cane who had been standing at the back of the crowd of families and friends who traveled to Ocean Isle Beach for a memorial to their loved ones.

"Did you make that cross?" Mann asked Charlie Lea, the owner of local welding company Lea Steel.

Just days after the house at 1 Scotland Drive erupted in flames, claiming the lives of six students from the University of South Carolina one from Clemson University, Lea and his sons and colleagues created an aluminum cross more than 5 feet tall and placed it by the charred remains of the house.

That cross now stands at the base of the Odell Williamson Bridge, near the Ocean Isle Beach Fire Department, as a memorial to the fire victims.

The students' names are engraved in a stone below the cross. They are Justin Anderson, Travis Cale, Lauren Mahon, Cassidy Pendley, William Rhea, Allison Walden and Emily Yelton. Six students survived the fire.

"Friends together forever," is also written on the stone, which was made by a local woman, Delores White.

Mann expressed her appreciation to Lea.

"I love the idea of the cross made by Mr. Lea," she said.

Genie Lee, whose son William Rhea died in the fire while another son, Andrew Rhea, survived, said she thought the Ocean Isle Beach community was caring and supportive.

"It was difficult to come, but I'm very glad I did," she said. "I'm very appreciative to the people of Ocean Isle Beach. They've hurt, too."

Ocean Isle Beach Mayor Debbie Smith said the town wanted to show the victims' families and friends that they cared.

"This tragedy touched the lives of all the people in this community," she said after a private memorial ceremony.

Most of the families of the victims and the survivors of the fire attended the ceremony, which was held inside the fire department. Those in attendance, including town officials, then walked to the site of the cross monument.

Smith said she hoped people passing the monument will remember that "this is a special place to bond with your friends and to bond with your family."

Lea said he hoped his gesture was a way to bring people together.

"I wanted to show that the people of Brunswick County cared," he said.

Shannan Bowen: 755-6307

shannan.bowen@starnewsonline.com


Comments

  1. bellaparola says...
    May 17, 2008 7:16:11 am

    RE: http://www.starnewsonline.com/article/20080516/ARTICLE/805160333

    I have been reading and hearing over and over this week about how the town/neighbors/football teams/whoever is going to "honor" the victims of this fire. While it is incredibly tragic and my heart goes out to their families, there is absolutely nothing about the way they died that merits "honoring." As this story clearly indicates, they are being remembered, memorialized, things are being done in their memory. "Honor" requires something more like active heroism or at least contribution to the community. Perhaps some of them did contribute during their short lives, but this is all about the fire, and "honor" certainly doesn't apply to passive victimhood or worse yet, succumbing as a result of active debauchery.

  2. Kingixolib says...
    May 18, 2008 3:42:09 am

    Puts a small burr under my saddle too! A group of kids that are priviledged enough to spend some time at an oceanside condo manage to burn the condo down around themselves and we "honor" or "memorialize" them.

    Well there were thousands of kids who weren't quite as priviledged and died in a war in Iraq and are still dying and I don't see this kind of concern for them!

    Just because they aren't dying in front of our eyes or we don't see the burnt ashes of the sites where they died doesn't make them any less important than those kids in Ocean Isle Beach but you wouldn't know it.

  3. Scupper Ball says...
    May 18, 2008 4:19:25 am

    Certainly one can understand families wanting to honor and memorialize loved ones...but to continue along the same path as Kingixolib, it kind of grates on me every morning as I have to drive up South 17th Street and look at the "memorial" to a drunk driver, who was responsible for his own death, (and the empty space of the live oak that brought his travels to a permanent halt).

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