HEALING SCIENCE (Block #8)

Located at The IMAG History and Science Center Museum in Fort Myers, FL

Name:  HEALING SCIENCE, 16,000 LBS.   Placement:  August, 2021

Location:  The IMAG History and Science Center Museum, 2000 Cranford Avenue, Fort Myers, FL  

Curator:  Matt Johnson  Phone:  239-243-0043   mjohnson@i-sci.org

Learn more about this Sculpture

              This is the perfect spot for this sculpture.  It is well known as a place of great exhibits, including a living lab, a hands-on grand hall where children of all ages build with huge foam blocks and mind magic puzzles, some dinosaur skeleton displays, a large water tank aquarium showcasing a model of the underwater artificial reef of the Mohawk ship, sunk 25 miles offshore of Fort Myers, in Lee County Florida. There is a Seminole Indian history Exhibit, Earth and Science exhibits, and an outdoor backyard nature area.  This museum is known for entertaining children and adults alike. The HEALING SCIENCE 9/11 sculpture will fit right in with its diversified displays.  

I have attached here wording from the Keynote speaker who was present at the dedication of this sculpture on September 11, 2021.  Her name is Janice Taub and a client of mine for a large painting I did for her a few years ago.  Janice gave an eloquent speech and here are her words dedicated to her brother George Strauch, who died on September 11, 2001.

***Thank you all for coming today to dedicate this memorial and to honor the
victims of 9/ll. My name is Janice Taub. I grew up in Kearny, New Jersey a
town that overlooked the NY skyline and was about 10 miles from Newark
Liberty Airport. Little did I know as a child playing with my friends and two
brothers in the street and listening to the planes constantly going overhead that
one day the view of the NY skyline and the sound of low flying planes would
become a source of great sorrow and anger.
I want to share with you today the story of someone very close to me who died
on 9/11, my older brother. George J. Strauch Jr. was 53 years old when he died
on 9/11/2001. He left behind his wife, Virginia, and 13-year-old daughter, Hilary.
He was working for AON Insurance as a loss prevention engineer at the time.
He was not meant to be in NY that day as he had work-related travel planned.
However, AON was moving its operation from the 98th floor to the 103 floor of
the South Tower that day and they asked that all personnel be on-site to help
with the move. After the North Tower was hit he called his wife and told her he
was fine. He said they were told they were safe in the South Tower and there
was no need to evacuate. That information proved to be misleading because
shortly after that phone call the South Tower was hit by a second plane and we
never heard from George again. Being a loss prevention engineer I imagined
him helping people get to the roof hoping for a helicopter rescue, that was not
meant to be. Even though all the immediate members of my family submitted
DNA to help in locating his remains, he was never found. We had no closure, nobody to bury, no place to go and mourn his loss.
George was a great big brother and so smart! He had a super good memory.
He read or saw things once and remembered all the details. He did well in
school and had lots of friends. He taught me to ride a 2 wheeler and cradled my
head on his yellow cub scout shirt when I fell and needed stitches over my eye.
He took me to see my first R-rated movie. He graduated from Newark College
of Engineering and was a member of the Tau Delta Phi fraternity. He was very
protective of his little sister when I was in college and interested in meeting his
fraternity brothers. He worked for an insurance company in Philadelphia first and
then got the job with AON in NYC. He commuted to NY daily on the train from
his home at the Jersey shore. I had a second home right around the corner from
him and we enjoyed a lot of family time during the summer months. He loved
baseball, especially the Yankees. He took his daughter to games in NY when he
could. He took her to the symphony in Philadelphia and tried to be present for
all of her swim meets. He loved to run along the boardwalk and go fishing in the
lake in front of his house or on a boat out of the Shark River Inlet. He enjoyed
passing his love of fishing onto my son, Timothy. He was the only one from the
small town of Avon-by-the-Sea, NJ to die that day. He was the oldest of three
children in our family and my mother had a very difficult time with his death as
any mother would when their child dies before they do. But she relied on her
faith in God and the support of her family and friends to get her through. My
younger brother Robert and I have been to the reflective pools and 9/11
Memorial Museum in NY. It is gut-wrenching to see a fire engine melted from the
heat. On display, there is a huge piece of concrete that was essential a few
floors of the building compressed into a mass of office furniture, computers,
paper, wires, cement and more. We have taken part in the formal ceremony
there reading the names of the deceased. Neither of us can watch the news
coverage each year when 9/11 rolls around as it is a stark reminder of what was,
and what could have been had George lived. Since no remains were ever found,
we placed a plaque on a bench dedicated to him on the Boardwalk in his
hometown of Avon-by-the-Sea. That is the only real memorial we have of his
life. We can go and sit there and remember the good times when our family was
whole. It’s hard to accept that this year he will be gone 20 years. I still miss him
every day.
My husband David and I built a house in Cape Coral in 2010 and moved here
permanently in the spring of 2012 after my Mom passed away at the age of 90.
Shortly after that, we went to a Home Show and we met a local artist names
Sandra Priest. We hired her to paint a mural on the wall of our new home.
Through our conversations, we realized we had a connection to 9/11. She not
only paints murals but creates concrete sculptures. Sandra is the artist who
created the 9/11 memorial that we are dedicating today. She rescued these
huge pieces of the slurry wall from the footings of the World Trade Center towers
when they were about to be discarded into a landfill in PA. She had them
transported first to Fort Myers and then to her property on Pine Island where she
sands and refines them. This year she decided to place three of these
memorial sculptures right here in Florida. The first is being dedicated today at
the Fireman’s Museum in Key West. A second cement memorial will be lowered into the Gulf 7 miles off Key West near the artificial reef created by the sinking of the USS Vandenburg in 2009. It is the second-largest artificial reef in the world.
Her cement memorial will be the first dive-able 9/11 memorial. The third one is
here at the IMAG in Fort Myers. It will be a place for people to come and
remember and to never forget all that were lost 20 years ago on that day of
terror, 9/11/2001. Thank you all for coming.***

More info

More Images of HEALING SCIENCE

Enjoy these exclusive behind-the-scenes photos and moments captured involving this memorial sculpture

News about HEALING SCIENCE

The article provides a brief overview of Sandra Priest, an American artist known for her sculptures and public art installations. It highlights her involvement in various projects, including the creation of memorials dedicated to the victims of 9/11. The article mentions her collaboration with New......

As the 20th anniversary of the tragic events of September 11, 2001, approaches, our collective memory turns to the heroes and the indomitable spirit displayed during that dark day in American history. One remarkable project, Project 911up, led by the talented artist Sandra Priest, is......

We are honored to be covered in this write up featured on LATIMES.com You can read the original article by clicking here. Here is what they had to say: ANA ROSA MENGOTTI MEAURIO journalist for EFE Translated from Spanish to English Practically the only thing......

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