Landmark for Peace Memorial

Landmark for Peace Memorial

Year	1994 (1994)
Type	bronze and Cor-Ten steel
Location	Indianapolis
Owner	Indianapolis Parks and Recreation Department

The Landmark for Peace Memorial is a memorial sculpture at Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Park on the northside of Indianapolis that honors the contributions of the slain leaders Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy. The sculpture, which features King and Kennedy reaching out to each other was designed by Greg Perry.

At the site of the memorial, on April 4, 1968, Robert Kennedy gave an impromptu speech to an inner city crowd about reconciliation between the races after he learned of the assassination of King. Kennedy was told that riots had broken out in other cities and he was advised not to make the speech. He refused to cancel his plans. Originally he intended to make a speech on his presidential aspirations, instead he spoke of King. No riots took place in Indianapolis, a fact many attribute to the effect of his speech.

Memorial Expansion

In April 2009, a $3 million expansion was planned for the memorial. Components of this expansion would include an eternal flame incorporated into the site, an amphitheater to seat 75 to 200 people, and twin elliptical walkways along a wall that abruptly end to symbolize the sudden end of the lives of King and Kennedy.

Memorial History

The idea to create the Landmark for Peace was originally suggested by Indiana Democratic politico Larry Conrad. Before his death, Conrad befriended Indianapolis Star art critic and Herron School of Art professor Steve Mannheimer and once spoke at length about the need to commemorate the events of April 4, 1968 and Robert Kennedy's speech to a crowd of campaign workers gathered near the corner of 17th and Broadway streets in Indianapolis. At the time Conrad was an executive with the Simon Property Group, the Indianapolis-based shopping mall developers, and a close friend of Herb Simon and his wife Diane, who had been a campaign worker in RFK's campaign at the time of his speech. Conrad suggested that should a memorial be created, the Simon family would offer its support.

In 1994, Donnie Walsh, president and CEO of the Indiana Pacers, owned by the Simon brothers, decided to start the Pacers Foundation to support worthy community initiatives. Walsh discussed his plans with Mannheimer, who recounted to Walsh the earlier conversation with Conrad, and Walsh immediately seized on the idea of a memorial as an ideal project to launch the Foundation and asked Mannheimer to direct the project together with Pacers executive, Kathy Jordan. Together, Mannheimer and Jordan developed a plan to hold a national design competition to create a memorial to both Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy. The Pacers and the Pacers Foundation then directed the community fundraising efforts for the project. Diane Simon donated $30,000 to begin, and the Pacers organization led the way to generate the rest.

Jurors for the competition included Bret Waller, the director of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, and Harry Robinson, a professor of architecture at Howard University. From a national field of over 50 entries, the jury selected the proposal by Indianapolis designer Greg Perry. Perry's design featured two half-figures—one of King, the other of Kennedy—emerging from solid walls flanking a pathway to reach toward each other. It was an inspired design that captured the historical importance of these two great Americans and powerfully expressed the spirit of reconciliation and the striving for peace people still found in the story of their lives—and deaths. Before the actual construction of the memorial began, a ceremonial groundbreaking for the memorial was held in 1994. This event attracted President Bill Clinton, Senator Ted Kennedy, RFK's widow Ethel Kennedy, two sons of Dr. King, Dexter Scott King and Martin Luther King, III as well as other Indiana and national dignitaries.

As the memorial construction got underway, the jury also suggested the need for design modifications to make Perry's original design more open and inviting. These modifications included a shortening and some physical piercing of the walls to allow greater visual penetration of the entire structure. Perry made the requested modifications, working with Mannheimer and figurative sculptor Daniel Edwards, who sculpted and oversaw casting of the figures of King and Kennedy, to fine-tune the original design. To relieve the monolithic solidity of the steel walls, the three conceived the idea of openings contoured to suggest shadows cast by the half-figures. After several attempts to shine bright lights on the half-figures to create actual shadows, Mannheimer drew the desired contours in chalk on the steel walls, which were then laser cut and smoothed to create the cut-outs. The total cost of creating and installing the memorial, including two markers with bronze plaques, approached $100,000. One of the markers contains the entire text of Kennedy's speech, parts of which were later inscribed on his own memorial at Arlington National Cemetery after the senator's assassination later that year. The other, which marks the actual spot from which Kennedy spoke, standing on the back of a flatbed truck, contains remnants of guns confiscated by the Indianapolis police.

The City of Indianapolis contributed significantly to the project by deciding to completely re-design the southern half of King Memorial Park, where the memorial was to stand. This project amounted to a $350,000 addition to the total project, overseen by the Indianapolis Parks and Recreation Department and its landscape architecture staff. The official unveiling of the memorial in 1996 attracted over 10,000 citizens.

External links

• Dr Martin Luther King, Jr Park from Indy Parks