This is my personal tale of two cities and my reaction to the
horrible tragedy that has befallen each. The cities, Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso,
Texas, both hold an important place in my life and I grieve with them as I
write this.
They are very different cities. Dayton is a somewhat typical
Midwestern city that was once anchored by an internationally-known company and
large auto-related manufacturing plants that have since moved elsewhere. The
area still has Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and the historical notoriety of
being the birthplace of the Wright Brothers, who invented the first airplane.
Nearly 1,600 miles southwest is El Paso, Texas, at the very
western tip of that state and directly across the Rio Grande River from Cuidad
Juarez, Mexico. El Paso is also home to a major military base, Ft. Bliss, and is
a major commercial and banking hub for western Texas.
The two cities are now linked in history by two acts of
violence that occurred only about 13 hours apart. On a sunny, hot Saturday
morning, a lone gunman with an AK-47 rifle opened fire in a Walmart parking lot
in El Paso and then went into the store to continue his killing spree. He
killed 22 people and injured 26 more before he was arrested a short distance
from the store.
This shooting took place in a large shopping area that
straddles I-10 for several miles and includes the Vista Cielo Mall to the east
of downtown El Paso. The suspect, 21-year-old Patrick Crusius, allegedly drove
600 miles from suburban Dallas before his bloody attack. Federal government
authorities will charge him with domestic terrorism and hate crimes because of
a manifesto he published on a white supremacy web site saying he wanted to kill
Mexican immigrants to prevent them from taking over the country.
Just 13 hours later, a lone gunman, 24-year-old Connor
Betts, from nearby Bellbrook, Ohio, began a shooting rampage in the Oregon
district, a popular nightlife district with bars and restaurants east of
downtown Dayton. This attack lasted about a minute before several Dayton Police
Department officers, who were routinely patrolling the area, shot and killed
the shooter before he could enter a crowded night club.
In this attack, nine were killed and 20 more were wounded.
As I write this, police still don’t have a precise motive for this attack, but
one of the fatalities was the 22-year-old sister of the shooter.
So, two cities that are so different are now connected
forever because of these atrocities. I am writing about each of them because I
have a personal connection to both.
When I was 14, my family moved from Columbus, Ohio, to the
Dayton area because my dad accepted a new job. I lived in the suburbs and
attended Archbishop Alter High School in nearby Kettering. Because this was
more than 50 years ago, I’m don’t know what the Oregon district was like back
then. When I turned 18 and was legally permitted to drink 3.2 percent beer, my
friends and I tended to visit bars along Brown Street close to the University
of Dayton. While I was in college at Miami University in nearby Oxford, Ohio, I
still returned to the Dayton area during holiday breaks and worked there during
the summer months. Since my 50-year class reunion in 2016, I have kept in touch
with several high school classmates who live in the Dayton area via Facebook.
While I don’t have a direct connection to the victims of the
Dayton shooting, I still feel emotional about the tragic deaths of a group of
people enjoying a warm summer night in the city that was an important part of
my growing up.
My connection with El Paso is much more recent. To get away
from the cold Ohio winter, I decided to rent an AirBnb property from
mid-January to the end of March this year in the Mission Hills section of El
Paso. Why El Paso? When doing my research about where to spend the winter, I
was intrigued by that city’s proximity to Mexico, both in location and culture and the dry desert climate.
I was not disappointed with my choice. This city of 680,000
is vibrant and interesting with a mix of both American and Mexican cultures.
About the half of the population of El Paso has a direct family link to nearby
Mexico. I rented a casita or small house while there and I could see Juarez in
the Mexican state of Chihuahua from the street in front of my house,
I took some non-credit classes at the University of Texas-El
Paso (UTEP) and learned about the history and culture of the area that locals
call the Borderland. I met some interesting people there and was intrigued how
the two cultures exist side-by-side in this city. At the local supermarket,
restaurants, coffee shops and on campus, hearing people speak both English and
Spanish was an everyday occurrence.
I went to El Paso to get relief from my chronic asthma and
allergies, but the elevation of the city of about 3,800 feet, proved to be a
problem for my breathing. If not for that, I would gladly go back next winter.
I really liked the city and the Borderland area.
Because the shootings in El Paso were apparently racially
motivated, my heart goes out to the people of a community where Americans and
Latinos live and work side-by-side in relative harmony. El Paso’s crime rate
has historically been much lower than the national average for a city its size.
So, I was deeply affected by the events of in both Dayton
and El Paso. I have a great deal of love for both communities and they are both
an important part of my life, although separated by about 50 years.
One final note. Ironically, both Dayton and El Paso are
linked by one thing I love: college basketball. The University of Dayton Flyers
have been a nationally-ranked mid-major power for years and I still root for
them most of the time, even though I am not an alumnus. They are a prominent
part of the community that was an important to me when I was growing up.
UTEP was formally called Texas Western University and, in
1966, the Miners won the NCAA national basket ball championship over Kentucky. I attended
a couple of games while I was in El Paso and joined fans in applauding a couple
of players and the coach’s wife when they were honored, even though they beat
my graduate school’s alma mater. The movie “Glory Road” celebrates this
incredible story.
So, I am very sad about the fate these two cities shared. I’m
not going to comment about our country’s gun laws or immigration policy here. These
are two cities that did not deserve what happened this weekend, but they will be
forever linked by tragic events. And, they will both have a place in my heart for
as long as I live.
No comments:
Post a Comment