The Oklahoma City bombing was a bomb attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995 by Timothy McVeigh, an American born and raise terrorist. In the days after the attack, a memorial wall sprung up. In 2006, I visited Oklahoma and the bomb site which by then was a memorial park. This photograph taken by me is of the memorial for Julie Marie Welch. I did not know Julie, but I was moved by her memorial. From the internet, I have learned that Julie was born in Oklahoma City on September 12, 1971. She attended college at attended college at Marquette University in Milwaukee, earning a B.A. in Spanish. She returned to Oklahoma City after graduating was a Spanish interpreter for the Social Security Administration on that fateful day. At the time she was killed by the bomb blast she was interviewing two men in Spanish. According to the internet, Julie would “frequently visited Little Flowers Church, in a poor Hispanic region of Oklahoma City, where she could speak with the Hispanic children and give them a ray of hope for their future. “ (http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=sh&GRid=8761431, last assessed on September 21, 2010). Julie purportedly was engaged to be married to an Air Force lieutenant at the time of her death. Her father, Bud Welch, is and was an outspoken advocate against the death penalty. (http://www.southernliving.com/travel/south-west/we-come-here-to-remember-00400000008162/, last assessed on September 21, 2010) I agree with him, by putting him to death, we have prevented Timothy McVeigh from suffering every day from the weight of his thoughts about his heinous crime. Julie was only 23 years old at the time of her death.
For Julie and the 167 others who died with her. (http://www.oklahomacitynationalmemorial.org/secondary.php?section=1&catid=24; last assessed September 21, 2010) Rest in Peace!