Post-its and Pencils: Library’s 9/11 Interactive Wall of Memories Attracts Attention

By Sue Robinson
VCU Libraries

Visitors to James Branch Cabell Library are pausing in front of the boards in the lobby reading, conversing and sharing their reflections and their memories about Sept. 11, 2001. The technology is as low-tech as you get these days: a Post-it note and a yellow pencil. 

The interactive wall of memories was set up as part of 9/11 Commemoration, a group of art installations and exhibitions. It started with one dry-erase board. Now, one week after the exhibit opened, there are five boards filled with notes. Some are simple notes or drawings. Some read "like," "agree" or have an arrow pointing to another comment.  

"This is the first time we've offered this sort of interactive opportunity and I think students like it," says Gregory Kimbrell, who coordinates events for VCU Libraries. "We try to do so much to serve our students, who come to the library to study and research. But, this time, we're giving them an opportunity to participate not as passive observers of an exhibit but as participants. I think it's been meaningful to people. As I walk past, I've seen many students in conversation at the boards or people quietly reading the notes and others pointing out particular comments to their friends."

Since most undergraduate students were children in 2001, most entries are of the "I was in school" ilk. One poster said "I was in the third grade and crying. My dad worked at the Pentagon. He survived."

Others wrote they were in New York or Washington and saw smoke and fire. Another shared a memory of watching TV coverage in the VCU Student Commons with a close friend.

Given the international scope of the VCU community, some writers note they were far from Richmond -- in Kenya, Venezuela, Germany, Ghana or Cambodia. One was on a plane traveling from India. Another was "in Kuwait watching the planes crash. I was evacuated a week later." One posting noted the writer was in Nigeria preparing for national exams on that fateful day. There's a "me too" note beside that one.

Among the hundreds of Post-its are these that remembered it as the day:

• Good Muslims will begin to forever be slandered by extremists.
• I became a firefighter.
• I decided to join the FBI.

One writer who identifies him or herself as a homeland security student wrote that "9/11 completely redirected the course of my life. Never forget."

9/11 Commemoration continues through Sept. 23 at Cabell Library on the Monroe Park campus.