Peace Monuments Dedicated in 1998

Right click image to enlarge.

January 4, 1998 - Hermann Stöhr Memorial, Hauptbahnhof, Berlin (Germany). Seven-ton boulder with a commemorative plaque. Dr. Hermann Stöhr [1898-1940] was was a German pacifist and resistance fighter against the Nazis. He was sentenced to death as a conscientious objector, but the sentence was annuled, one of the rare times this happened in Nazi Germany. Memorial dedicated on Stöhr's 100th birthday.

January 24, 1998 - Statue of Mahatma Gandhi, Visitors Center, Martin Luther King, Jr., National Historic Site, Atlanta, Georgia (USA). By Ram Sutar. There are other Gandhi statues in Cleveland, Houston, New York City, San Francisco, Sherborn, MA, Skokie, IL, and Washington, DC, not to mention India, London and Uganda.

February 3, 1998 - Campana de la Paz Mundial / World Peace Bell, Jardin Japonés / Japanese Garden Center, Buenos Aires (Argentina). Commemorates centennial of peace between Brazil & Japan. One of 20 WPB's placed in 16 different countries by the World Peace Bell Association (WPBA) of Toyko (Japan).

February 8, 1998 - Peace Grove, Perth, Western Australia (Australia). Honoring Nobel Peace Prize laureates Anwar Sadat and Yatzhan Rabin.

April 7, 1998 - Gernika Peace Museum, Foru plaza,1. E 48300 Gernika-Lumo (Spain). Site of 5th International Conference of the International Network of Museums for Peace (INMP) in 2005. Image shows the museum's reproduction of Guernica, the famous 1937 painting by Pablo Picasso.

April 1998 - Atlanta Dojo, Nipponzan Myohoji, 1127 Glenwood Avenue, Atlanta, Georgia (USA). "In December 1993, an abandoned drug house in East Atlanta was purchased and with volunteer labor and salvaged building material rebuilt, expanded and greatly transformed into a beautiful temple and garden."

May 19, 1998 - La Cloche de la Paix / Peace Bell, Japanese Garden, Montréal Botanical Gardens, 4101 Sherbrooke Street East, Montréal, Québec (Canada). "Created from an original design by Masahiko Katori Masahiko [1899-1988], modelled on the Hiroshima bell." Presented by the Hon. Takashi Hiraoka, Mayor of Hiroshima, after signing a sister city agreement between the two cities. Entry #1357 in the "Peace Movement Directory" by James Richard Bennett (2001).

Spring 1998 - Garden for Peace #5, Lakewold Gardens, Tacoma, Washington (USA). One of many Gardens for Peace in the USA & other countries.

June 1, 1998 - International Peace Garden, Rideau Canal, Ottawa, Ontario (Canada). One of many International Peace Gardens in different countries.

June 12, 1998 - Anne Frank Tree, corner of Garrick Street & New Row, London (England). In front of the British Library. Planted by Anne Frank Trust. Has plaque on pub wall. Info courtesy of Valerie Flessati (2012). This is 1 of 45 monuments in her "Peace Trails through London," page 4.

June 1998 - Peace Mural, 29th & Wharton Streets (southwest corner), Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (USA). Muiral by Jane Golden & Peter Pagast. Inscribed "Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God." Note children in foreground of the image.

June 26, 1998 - Dhamma-Talaka Peace Pagoda, Buddhist Centre, Edgbaston, Ladywood district, Birmingham (England). "The pagoda is provided so that western people are able to learn about Buddhism. The main financial support however comes from generous donations by the Myanmar community around the country." The Venerable Dr. Rewata Dhamma is a senior Burmese Buddhist Monk who is the prime mover behind the building of the pagoda.

1998 - Peace Garden / Fire Circle, Campbell's Island, Quad Cities, Illinois (USA). Lead artist is Kinhild Blacklock. "Designed to honor the Native American history of the site & is intended to contrast with the existing War Monument at the site."

1998 - Peace Garden, Lyndale Park, Minneapolis, Minnesota (USA). Includes a peace rock garden (qv) and stones from Hiroshima & Nagasaki (qv). Designated an International Peace Site in 1999. Entry #523 in the "Peace Movement Directory" by James Richard Bennett (2001).

1998 Date? Sept. 30, 1998 Oct. 1998 -Mid 1999 May 2002 Jan. 2003 May 2003 July 2005 August 2006

1998 - The Los Alamos Study Group Billboard Campaign, Albuquerque, New Mexico (USA). "Beginning in 1998, visitors to New Mexico could encounter one of the most direct & imaginative efforts to engage New Mexico’s nuclear economy simply by driving out of the Albuquerque International Airport. On the main exit [of] the airport, a large billboard confronted motorists with an image of a rainbow-enhanced desert & the words (see top image at left): 'Welcome to New Mexico: America’s Nuclear Weapons Colony.' Seeking to defamiliarize the desert landscape through shock, the billboard both evokes & inverts the familiar portrait of New Mexico as the 'Land of Enchantment,' a zone of pristine nature & exotic culture. A Web site address on the billboard - www.lasg.org - serves as both a signature & an invitation for viewers to learn more about the scale of the US nuclear project in New Mexico (which includes two of the three national weapons laboratories, the largest missile testing range in the continental USA, the largest arsenal of US nuclear weapons & the most active US nuclear waste dumps). By recontextualizing a centrally located commercial space, the billboard challenges residents & visitors alike to recognize an invisible presence in New Mexico, one that colonizes the austere beauty of the landscape with the nuclear science, toxicity & militarism of a global superpower. The 'Welcome' sign was merely the first salvo in an ongoing billboard campaign orchestrated by the Los Alamos Study Group (LASG), a nonproliferation & peace activism group formed in the waning days of the Cold War. As one of the most vocal nuclear watchdog groups in New Mexico, the LASG has vigorously challenged the post–Cold War consolidation of nuclear weapons science at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) while promoting public education about the accruing environmental effects of the nuclear complex. In a December 2003 discussion in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Greg Mello, the cofounder & director of the LASG, explained to me that the billboards started as a response to a lack of public conversation about the evolution of the nuclear complex in New Mexico at the end of the 1990's. They were also a reaction to the high cost & episodic nature of newspapers, radio & television. Billboards could make a long-term, highly visible statement at, as Mello calculates it, 'one-tenth of a cent per viewer.' Billboards thus offered a new kind of political space that could perform a complex set of ideological tasks in an economical manner. From the start, the goals of the LASG billboard project have been to puncture the normality of the nuclear economy by linking New Mexico’s two leading industries -tourism & nuclear weapons - and to present a stable & highly visible space for political dissent & nuclear critique. For Mello, the project is also intended to 'slow down' the media space in order to encourage public contemplation in a largely commuter & tourist economy, thereby transforming New Mexico’s road culture into a new conceptual space for political critique. As part of a larger activist effort in New Mexico to 'use the tourists to get rid of the plutonium, or the plutonium to get rid of the tourists,' the LASG project, as described by Mello, is interested in provoking a 'more enlightened form of tourism,' one that could ultimately contribute to the LASG’s environmental & nonproliferation efforts. Placed for maximum visibility along the main thoroughfares and highways that connect Albuquerque to Santa Fe & ultimately Los Alamos, the LASG billboards speak directly to occupants of the twenty-five thousand cars that travel Interstate 25 daily. Mello told me that the LASG initially had specific audiences in mind for the billboard campaign, namely, laboratory management (Los Alamos National Laboratory is a Department of Energy institution managed by the University of California), state & federal politicians, & particularly new recruits to the weapons program who might be visiting on job interviews. By visually disrupting the assumed social consensus on the role of the nuclear economy in New Mexico, the LASG seeks to document for policy makers & employees evidence of local resistance & hope for an alternative nuclear future. The billboard project is also a direct response to decreasing access to policy makers & laboratory personnel after a brief period of post–Cold War openness. After a series of security scandals at Los Alamos in 2002), expanding secrecy within the nuclear complex has forced activists to seek an alternative public sphere to mobilize for change. Pursuing the LASG’s political agenda in visual statements that are 48 feet wide by 18 feet high, the billboard campaign has raised a wide range of provocative issues since 1998. The first billboards provided a direct counterdiscourse to the US nuclear project in New Mexico, while more recent efforts have responded to the expanding forms of US militarism under the Bush administration’s 'war on terror.' Evoking the 1930' Works Progress Administration (WPA) aesthetic that is featured in much of the tourist literature about New Mexico, the second LASG billboard asks: 'New Mexico: #1 in Nuclear Weapons, #1 in Poverty - Coincidence?.' Here, the LASG challenges the primary local justification for the nuclear weapons complex - that it provides jobs for New Mexicans. But while LANL currently maintains an annual budget of over $2 billion, New Mexico has for decades competed for the title of poorest state in America. Marshaling equally alarming statistics about violent crime, drug abuse, suicide, alcoholism & the condition of the public school system in New Mexico, the LASG has argued that the nuclear economy has actually prevented other sustainable industries from developing, creating a highly distorted regional economy dangerously reliant on external investments. For Mello, New Mexico is 'held hostage' to Washington, D.C., because of its poverty. Consequently, New Mexico is part of that rural American economic space that relies on toxicity, vice, security & industrial livestock or, as Mello puts it, the 'four P's - plutonium, poker, prisons & pigs.' By arguing that the nuclear complex prevents the development of a sustainable regional economy, the 'Coincidence' billboard also moves the discussion of what constitutes security from the realm of geopolitics to the terms of everyday life...." -- By Joseph Masco in "Public Culture" (2005).

1998? - Ninth International Peace Garden, Maputo (Mozambique). One of many International Peace Gardens in different countries.

1998 - Fuji Sanctuary, Byakko Shinko Kai, Asagiri Plateau (Japan). Byakko was founded in Tokyo by Masahisa Goi [1916-1980]. Its headquarters at Hijirigaoka / Holly Hill, Tokyo, were moved in 1998 to the Fuji Sanctuary, and all of the Tokyo structures were removed.

1998 - Bell of Peace ("Hirarillon"), Okahigashi Cho Park, Hirakata?, Osaka (Japan). Carillon (Western-style bells) and monument depicting the legend of separated lovers, Princess Shokujo (the star Vega) and (Prince Kengyu (the star Altair), right image.

S T A T U E

1998 - Commemorative Monument of Peace and Unity, Legislative Building, San Pedro Street, Davao City, Mindanao (Phillippnes). "Unveiled during the celebration of the Philippine Centennial... Depicts the peaceful relationship of the migrant and indigenous inhabitants of Davao in the last 100 years."

1998 - Children's Peace Center, Episcopal Cathedral of the Incarnation, 4 East University Parkway, Baltimore, Maryland (USA). "A Children’s Peace and Memorial Garden...was created in memory of children that have been killed each year in Baltimore City due to street violence, and to offer a space for contemplation and healing." Handmade tiles commemorating the lives of children are embedded near the site. See TKF Foundation.

1998 - Count Folke Bernadotte Memorial, United Nations, New York City, New York (USA). Entry #748 in the "Peace Movement Directory" by James Richard Bennett (2001). Count Folke Bernadotte [1895-1948] was a Swedish diplomat who was assassinated in Jerusalem.

M U R A L

1998 - "A shenere un besere velt / A more beautiful & better world," Workmen’s Circle building, 1525 South Robertson Boulevard, Los Angeles, California (USA). "Mural by Eliseo Silva (an immigrant from the Philippines) explores numerous themes including Jewish holidays, culture, education, traditional Jewish support for labor & social justice, universal healthcare, immigrant rights & the Yiddish language, as well as the historic struggles against fascism & totalitarianism. Depicts great Yiddish writers, such as Mendele, Sholem Aleichem & Peretz, cultural leaders such as Cesar Chavez, Martin Luther King & Sugi Hara, and the Jewish holidays are celebrated in bigger than life size. Speaks not only to the Jewish community, but to other immigrant communities in Los Angeles."

1998 - "Peace Museums Worldwide," United Nations Publications on Peace, Geneva (Switzerland). "League of Nations Archives, Geneva, in Association with the Department of Peace Studies, University of Bradford (England)." 162 pages. Edited by Prof. Peter Van Den Dungen et al.

1998 - Peace Rock, yard of James Richard (Dick) Bennett, Fayetteville, Arkansas (USA). Sculpted by Hank Kaminsky. About 4-feet wide. Bears names of 30 male & female peacemakers. Entry #31 in the "Peace Movement Directory" by James Richard Bennett (2001).

1998 - "Mother Theresa of Calcutta," St. Mary's Cathedral, Peoria, Illinois (USA). Heroic size 6-foot bronze satue by Lonnie Stewart. "Mother Theresa visited the cathedral for a special mass in her honor in December 1995. The cathedral has been a Peoria landmark & religious epicenter for over a century." Mother Theresa [1910-1997] received the Nobel Peace prize in 1979.

1998 - Peace Garden / Fire Circle, Campbell's Island, Quad Cities, Illinois (USA). Lead artist is Kinhild Blacklock. "Designed to honor the Native American history of the site & intended to contrast with the existing War Monument at the site."

1998 - My Lai Peace Park, My Lai (Viet-Nam). A project of the Madison Quakers. At site of the My Lai Massacre on March 16, 1968.

1998 - Commemorative Monument of Peace and Unity, Davao City Hall, Davao, Mindinao (Philippines). Unveiled during the celebration of the Philippine Centennial. Depicts the peaceful relationship of the migrant and indigenous inhabitants of Davao in the last 100 years.

1998 - "In Flanders Fields" Museum, City of Ieper, Lakenhallen Grote Markt 34, Ieper / Ypres (Belgium). In historic Lakenhallen / Cloth Hall. Depicts World War I.

1998 - Friedensmuseum Nürnberg / Nürnberg Peace Museum, Kaulbachstrasse 2, Nürnberg (Germany). Documents the German peace movement.

1998 - Kanagawa Plaza for Global Citizenship (KPGC) - Earth Plaza, 1-2-1 Kosugaya, Sakae-ku, Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture (Japan). Exhibits particularly oriented to children. One of 9 Japanese institutions described in brochure for 6th International Conference of the INMP in 2008.

1998 - 3rd International Conference of the International Network of Museums for Peace (INMP) in Osaka and Kyoto (Japan). Arranged by a number of Japanese museums. Theme: "The contribution of museums to world peace."

1998-April 2006 - Monumento de la Memoria, Comunidad de Paz, San José de Apartadó, Uraba (Colombia). "The Community was established on Palm Sunday, March 1997, the villagers declaring themselves neutral in the Colombian armed conflict." /// "In 1998, we constructed a monument to our assassinated members, built of painted stones with the names of those murdered." /// "The San José de Apartadó massacre was a massacre of five men & three children perpetrated by members of the Military of Colombia and United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia between February 21–22, 2005." /// "Founded by displaced people, the Community itself was displaced last year [2005] when the government installed a police post inside Community grounds - against the Community's wishes & its internal rules that prohibit the carrying of weapons or cooperation with any armed actor." /// "When we had to leave the Community last year [2005], we had to leave the monument... This April [2006], the police destroyed the monument in full view of members of the Community. That tells us that they do not want to have any communication with the Community, and that they don't want us to have our memory - they want to take everything away."

July 9, 1998 - Ten Martyrs of the 20th Century, Great West Door, Westminister Abbey, London (England). Image shows Mother Elizabeth of Russia, Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., Archbishop Oscar Romero and Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Named in "A Peace Trail Through London" by Valerie Flessati (1998).

1998 - A Peace Trail Through London, London (England). "Discover some of the people and visit [nine] places associated with national and international peacemaking." Leaflet 40p + SAE from 11 Venetia Road, London N4 1EJ. Compiled by Valerie Flessati.

July 21, 1998 - Parque de la Memoria, frente al Río de la Plata, Zona Norte, Buenos Aires (Argentina). "Fin de recordar a las víctimas del régimen militar de terrorismo de estado conocido como Proceso de Reorganización Nacional (1976-1983)." Left image: Sin título, escultura de Roberto Aizenberg [1928-1996] representando seres fragmentados. Right image: Monumento al escape, escultura de Dennis Oppenheim, dedicated in October 2006.

Summer 1998 - Pearl of the Pacific, Shelter Island, San Diego, California (USA). Other Pacific Rim Parks are in Tijuana (Mexico), Vladivostok (USSR) & Yantai (China).

October 15, 1998 - Volontarios Internacionales de la Liberdad (Memorial to Abraham Lincoln Brigage), University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (USA). Dedicated to the veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade (1936-1939). It reads: "11 students from the University of Washington joined that historic struggle." Other ALB memorials in Madison, WI, & San Francisco, CA (qv).

F O U N T A I N

October 24, 1998 - J. William Fulbright Peace Fountain, between Old Main & Vol Walker Hall, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas (USA). Designed by E. Fay Jones [1921-2004] & Maurice Jennings. "Honors J. William Fulbright [1905-1995], and his belief that 'education, particularly study abroad, has the power to promote tolerance & understanding among nations.'" Fulbright was president of this university 1939-1941. As US Senator, he chaired the Committee on Foreign Relations 1959-1974 & founded "Fulbright Program" which makes competitive, merit-based grants for international educational exchange by students, scholars, teachers, professionals, scientists & artists, Click here for webcam. Entry #28 in the "Peace Movement Directory" by James Richard Bennett (2001).

Date? - Statue of J. William Fulbright, Old Main, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas (USA).

November 11, 1998 - Páirc Síochána d'Oileán na h'Éireann / Island of Ireland Peace Park, Mesen / Messines, near Ypres, Flanders (Belgium). A war memorial to the soldiers of the island of Ireland who died, were wounded or are missing from World War I. Includes the Irish Peace Tower (shown in image), a symbolic Irish round tower.

November 11, 1998 - Northern Ireland Peace Bell, Páirc Síochána d'Oileán na h'Éireann / Island of Ireland Peace Park, Mesen / Messines, near Ypres, Flanders (Belgium).

December 20, 1998 - World Wall For Peace (WWFP), Ashkenaz Music & Dance Community Center, Berkeley, California (USA).

Late 1998 - The Peace Museum, Bradford (England). Office opened in 1994; gallery opened in 1998. Close to Department of Peace Studies, University of Bradford, which was the site of 1st International Conference of the International Network of Museums for Peace (INMP) in 1992. One of only 4 "musuems for peace" in the UK (vs. about 70 in the USA).