×

Williamstown school unveils garden

Photo by Tyler Bennett An Angel Guardian statue was donated from Bob’s Market and Greenhouse home office in Mason, W.Va., is part of the Garden of Freedom located at Williamstown Middle/High School.

WILLIAMSTOWN — In honor of the 19th anniversary of those lost in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the “Garden of Freedom” was unveiled at Williamstown Middle/High School on Wednesday afternoon.

The garden is a joint project between Lori Daughterty’s sixth-grade science enrichment class and Tyler Chaddrock’s shop students with help from middle school social studies teacher Angela Roach, Williamstown Middle school Principal Jason Ward and Assistant Principal Jeff Mennillo.

After spending several weeks learning about the tragic event before they were even born, the students came up with the idea of the garden to honor those that passed away in 2001.

“It was all based upon the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, to honor the people that died and those that tried to save the plane that crashed at the Pentagon,” Williamstown sixth-grader Gavin Buck said.

“We were learning about 9/11 and this was just kind of something that evolved through the couple weeks that we were working on it,” Roach said. “We were able to locate donors for most of the materials donated to the project so that we were able to represent those who lost their lives 19 years ago. I started and Mrs. Daugherty took the reins on it and developed really nicely.”

The Garden is a pentagon shape to remember the 125 men, women, and children killed at the nation’s defense center.

The mums are representative of the 40 people lost in Shanksville, Pa., on Flight 93. The pansies denote the nearly 3,000 lives lost in Towers 1 and 2 of the World Trade Center.

The Garden will be perpetually blooming as spring bulbs are being added now and summer flowers will follow next year.

“We put all of our hard work into this for the school, for all the 9/11 survivors and people that died there. It was really fun creating this with all my buddies. This was great,” sixth-grader Isaac Harris said.

Donations included flowers from Bob’s Market and Greenhouse of Belpre, the angel guardian statue from Bob’s Market and Greenhouse’s home office in Mason, W.Va., mulch from Scots Landscaping of Vienna, weather LED solar spotlights from Williamstown Middle/High School teacher Cynthia Shawver, and framing and landscape weed prevention fabric provided by Lowes of Marietta.

“We built this in honor of all the people that died almost 20 years ago on 9/11 to represent them and how they died. Like how people risked their lives on Flight 93 crashing in Shanksville, Pa. It was really fun with my friends,” sixth-grader Zander Boyce said.

The students that worked on the garden were: Kadence Bandy, Makaela Bandy, Blake Bolyard, Lindsey Bondi, Zander Boyce, Gavin Buck, Miles Flanagin, Cooper Flowers, Isaac Harris, Christian Hoosier, Macy Phelps, Harley Phillips, and Wyatt Siley.

Contact Tyler Bennett at tbennett@newsandsentinel.com

NEWSLETTER

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *

Starting at $4.15/week.

Subscribe Today