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Boston's Biggest Sign of the Times
Handgun Control Group Devotes Largest Billboard To Honoring Terror Victims 
  
By Pamela Ferdinand
Special to The Washington Post
Tuesday, November 6, 2001; Page A02 


BOSTON, Nov. 5 -- For the first time since it went up in 1995, the nation's
largest billboard has changed its tune. 

Until today, the 252-foot-long, 20-foot-high landmark sign along the
Massachusetts Turnpike, not far from Boston's Fenway Park, had been devoted to
messages opposing handgun violence. But in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks,
owner John Rosenthal decided it was time to broaden the focus of the billboard
from child victims of firearms to victims of terrorism, young and old.

The new memorial billboard evokes the somber mood of the Vietnam War Memorial
with roughly 850 victims' names printed in gray on a solid black background. 

All victims of the American and United Airlines flights and the Pentagon attack
are listed. World Trade Center victims appear in alphabetical order to the
letter G. 

The name of John Ogonowski, the pilot of American Airlines Flight 11, appears
first. Craig Gibson, an employee of Marsh & McLennan in New York, is shown
last. In larger, off-white lettering floating above the names, the billboard
reads, "September - 11 - 2001 . . . and our flag was still there." 

"Everything changed for America, and we felt it was appropriate to change our
message as well," said Rosenthal, 45, co-founder and chair of Stop Handgun
Violence, a nonprofit group he founded with the late Michael Kennedy of
Citizens Energy Corp., one of his best friends. "Any one of us could be a name
on this board."

Viewed by an estimated 200,000 drivers each day, the billboard has previously
posted such messages as "The cost of handguns keeps going up. 15 kids killed
every day." Rosenthal's initiative helped pave the way for Massachusetts to
enact the toughest gun laws in the nation in 1998 and drew the attention of
then-President Bill Clinton.

"The president would always comment on how effective he thought the billboard
was," said Jennifer Palmieri, a former Clinton press aide. "By taking a
different approach to the issue, [Stop Handgun Violence] was able to get really
good and strong laws passed that are much more effective than on the federal
level."

The new memorial billboard is signed, "Respectfully, Stop Handgun Violence,"
but Rosenthal says that, at least this time, it is not meant to further his
group's agenda. One of his tenants died and an advertiser's son-in-law was
killed in the Sept. 11 attacks. 

"We have a tremendous responsibility owning this billboard, and we wanted to be
part of the national healing process," he said.


  
           
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