Page 32 - APRIL-2019_SlipperyRockGazette

32|April 2019
Polycor Inc. Honors their
Veteran Employees by
Collaborating with The
Veterans Portrait Project
Slippery rock GAzette
Night at the Museum
Military explosive special- ists destroyed a World War II-era mortar round found at an Alaska museum after de- termining the munition was live.
The device was destroyed by detonating it at a safe place, said Capt. Brandon Browning of the 716th Explosive Ordnance Disposal.
A staff member found the Japanese mortar round in February while sorting through the collections vault at the Sheldon Museum and Cultural Center in Haines, the Anchorage Daily News reported.
When staff members could not confirm if the shell had been disarmed, the museum tempo- rarily closed.
Explosives specialists from Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson in Anchorage later determined the device was still live, the newspaper said.
The museum was considering using the shell in an upcoming exhibit featuring World War II battle art, but the item’s dona- tion paperwork did not indicate if it had been deactivated, said Helen Alten, the museum’s director.
The 80mm shell did not have a detonator on top. Museum of- ficials concluded the shell likely was disabled, but because they could not be sure, they notified police, Alten said.
The shell has been in the mu- seum’s possession for more than 20 years, Alten said. It was do- nated by a longtime Haines res- ident who was a World War II veteran. In all that time, no one had looked closely at it.
Staff members worked out of a public library while the mu- seum closed.
The museum’s new exhibit is still scheduled to open – without the suspicious shells.
ATPolycor, we share the same values of our mil- itary veterans: devotion, gener- osity, commitment, and last year we had an opportunity to create a monument in honor of these men
and women and their values.
Steven Schrenk
Polycor
Photos © Stacy Pearsall
Photographer Stacy Pearsall’s creative vision celebrates the commitmentandgenerosityofthemenandwomenwhoded- icated their lives to America.
The inscription reads: “THE LIVING MONUMENTS GENEROSITY. COMMITMENT. WE SALUTE THE DIVERSITY OF HEROES WHO STAND UP FOR THEIR BELIEFS EVERY DAY.”
DEVOTION.
We were proud to collaborate with the renowned American photographer Stacy Pearsall on The Veterans Portrait Project with ‘The Living Monuments’ campaign, to honor and celebrate the courage and devotion of our veteran employees - while they’re very much alive.
“Polycor employs almost 60 veterans in the US. When we saw Stacy’s work, we wanted to do something to thank them for their service and so, quite naturally, we thought of a stone monument,” Perus said. “We often commem- orate the veterans who have lost their lives at war, but those who have fought for this beautiful country and survived are often forgotten.”
Polycor’s campaign included exclusive behind-the-scenes video footage, interviews, por- traits and heartwarming content that it will continue to share on social media through June 2019.
“My process is to capture or- ganic poses that are natural to the individuals and who they are,” Pearsall said. “My goal is to con- tinue to raise awareness for vet- erans in our communities and to
keep them at the forefront of peo- ple’s minds.”
The monument serves as both an independent marker as well as a podium upon which individuals can stand. The monument will be installed after Thanksgiving 2019 in the Rock of Ages Visitors’ Center in Barre, Vermont – a Polycor subsidiary – where guests can view the video of the collaboration as well as the iconic images.
For more information on the project, and links to a short video documenting Pearsall’s process of photographing the veterans, visit the website https://blog.polycor. com/together-we-build-land- marks-for-humanity .
The Veterans Portrait Project captures portraits and stories throughout the U.S. with the aim of raising awareness for the veteran community through dig- ital media and print exhibits na- tionwide. For more information, visit their website www.veterans portraitproject.com or follow their social media profiles on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Individual and group portraits of the Polycor vets used the mon- ument block as both a podium and a common identifying theme for the project. Some 60 veterans are employed by Polycor, at different locations around the U.S..
“The limits of the possi- ble can only be defined by going beyond them into the impossible.” — Arthur C. Clarke