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The road led to full campus that housed all of the Whitwell schools.  After a series of twists and turns, we found ourselves staring at the boxcar.  It sat securely on a pair of rails and was surrounded by a locked, six foot high, wrought iron fence.  Sculptures of children and butterflies were placed around the car.  Flagstones of ornate, stained glass butterflies surround the Memorial and formed paths both inside and outside the fence.

As I snapped picture after picture, my wife was exploring on her own.  She called my attention to a sign.  The sign said that self-guided tours were available.  All I had to do was drive to the police station on Highway 28 and see the town clerk.  We wasted no time.  At the station, a friendly, helpful lady gave me a cassette tape player that contained a recording of the story of the Memorial.  She also handed me a key.  I signed a guest book there and noted that I was representing the Globaldreamers.  We headed back to the Memorial.

I unlocked the gate.  My wife pulled a second guest book from a nearby cabinet.  We read some of the entries.  The words, left by people from all walks of life and all over our planet, were deeply personal.  It was as if they were each trying to talk to the victims represented here, trying to let them know how much they cared, how they had been changed by their visit.

Slowly, we walked up the ramp to the open door of the car.  The heat was stifling.  It was 92 degrees.  My shirt was quickly sweat stained.  Paper clips, paper clips filled both ends of the car.  They had been poured in loosely, filling the two areas that measured nine feet, by six feet, by two feet.  There wasn’t a breath of air moving in the car.  I turned to my wife.  Our eyes, brimming with tears, met.  We held each other there.

We tried to imagine more than a hundred men, women, and children crammed into that boxcar.  We heard their cries, their questions, their prayers, their fears.  I felt the vomit of disgust and hate rise in my throat.  Though my own German ancestors left the Fatherland more than 250 years ago, somehow, I felt responsible.  I felt ashamed, and I didn’t know why.

I took pictures, dozens of them.  Many of them will be posted here by my good friend, Marsha.  I saw where many visitors had left a stone to mark there visit and the memories that had been made there.  I had a small stone of my own.  I left it there, near the others.

In due time, my wife and I secured the gate and made our way back to our car.  We had been the only visitors that day.  We sat in our car and stared at the box car for some time.  Tears and sweat mingling on our cheeks, we said a prayer of remembrance and commitment and drove back to the police station to return the key.  The clerk did not ask about our visit.  She had been around long enough to know what was filling our hearts.  As I turned to leave, she told me that a second movie was going to be made of the project.  The students of Whitwell Middle School are still, “Changing the World...One Class at a Time.”